Mauritian company Bharat Telecom has announced plans to roll out a 2900km network to bring fibre to the home (FTTH) technology to the country’s households.

The $50 million investment plans to connect 70% of Mauritius’ population in phase one of the rollout, with the other 30% forecast to be connected under Phase 2, according to a report by Balancing Act.

“Tests of FTTH technology are already underway in one community and trials are due to launch soon,” said Baljinder Sharmar, director, Bharat Telecoms.

Together with the fibre network roll out, the company further plans to offer high speed broadband at speeds of up to 100Mbps and IPTV services via its Gigabit Passive Optical Network (GPON) network.

Danson Njue, analyst, Informa Telecoms & Media Group told ITWeb Africa, “Internet connectivity in Mauritius is far more advanced than any other African country so it was only a matter of time that a company like Bharat would look to connecting residential areas.”

Bharat Telecoms has targeted 50 000 subscribers, promising to offer packages such as 2Mbps connection with 40 TV channels for $10 per month, increasing to $200 a month for a premium content package.

Bharat also intends to break the tradition of users being tied to long-term contracts.

Sharmar told Balancing Act, “I personally want us to disrupt the whole market. The cheaper it is, the more up-take there will be and therefore there will be more subscribers, which in turn will sustain lower bandwidth prices.”

According to the World Economic Forum Mauritius is ranked 53rd in the world in terms of the network readiness index, making the island-state the highest ranked country in Africa.