At AfricaCom in Cape Town this week multinational telco Angola Cables signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Broadband Infraco to extend internet connectivity within Africa.

Broadband Infraco provides regional long-distance network coverage and SADC connectivity. According to information supplied, the company claims to have over 14 960km of fibre network across South Africa and 156 Points of Presence (PoPs).

Angola Cables CEO, António Nunes, said that the partnership will facilitate internet connectivity into Africa. "With our international connectivity and reach through our submarine networks and the expansive terrestrial network of Broadband Infraco, there is a genuine opportunity for us to collectively fast-track connectivity on the continent" added Nunes.

"The very real possibility now exists to connect Brazil and South Africa to the other BRICS nations of Russia, India and China through a high speed, low latency connection," said Nunes. "Such a connection together with our robust network will accelerate international co-operation on multiple levels, promote economic development and fast-track projects that will enable new opportunities for digital content exchange across the region."

Andrew Matseke, CEO of Broadband Infraco said that the partnership is pivotal in the development of digital connectivity within South Africa and Africa. "We have POPs and fibre connectivity options to all neighbouring SADC countries. Through the Angola Cables subsea networks, SACS and Monet, Broadband Infraco will have the ability to share international traffic and content that could unlock new business opportunities for SADC countries."

Nunes added, "Angola Cables will also be in a position to support our new partner in other projects that are of national importance and which require global network connectivity. An example of this, is the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project, the world's largest telescope where Broadband Infraco is the main supplier of international capacity to Europe. Given the large data requirements, the scientific information can now be shared with other entities."

The partners add that their alliance will advance business channel synergies and offer South African consumers "an improved usage, low-latency or ´no lag experience' that is of particularly benefit to the gaming community - or other users requiring greater bandwidth via the SACS routing to South America," concluded Nunes.

In September 2018 the South Atlantic Cable System (SACS) went on-stream and open for commercial traffic.

Angola Cables explained that SACS has been manufactured and powered by NEC Corporation and "is one of the most advanced submarine telecommunications systems to go into commercial operation connecting Angola (Africa) and Brazil (South America)."

"Data transfer speeds will be greatly improved (five times faster than existing cable routings), reducing latency from Fortaleza (Brazil) to Luanda (Angola) from 350ms to 63ms. Luanda will also connect to London and Miami with approximately 128 milliseconds latency. These two major content hubs, will position Angola as a strategic point to serve the transatlantic region with low latency and resilient connections," the company stated.