This Industry Viewpoint was authored by Hannes Gredler, Founder and CTO at RtBrick

Earth Day 2023 is right around the corner on April 22, and it’s a great opportunity to reflect on the telecoms industry’s environmental footprint. E-waste not only affects the amount of greenhouse gas (GHG) being put into the atmosphere, but studies have shown that there are even negative health effects for adults and children. The telecoms sector itself is a large contributor … [visit site to read more]

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The latest landing of the 2Africa cable has been announced: it’s at Port Said, at the northern end of the Suez Canal, on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast.

The 2Africa cable had already landed at Telecom Egypt’s cable landing station in Ras Ghareb on the eastern coast of Egypt, in November 2022.

As the Data Centre Dynamics website points out, the Suez Canal is  a major thoroughfare for subsea cables crossing between the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean. Despite this, this is only the second cable landing at Port Said following Telecom Egypt’s Red2Med cable that launched last year.

However, Data Centre Dynamics adds, the Africa-1, FEA, Medusa, India-Europe-Xpress (IEX), and SeaMeWe6 cables are all due to land at Port Said over the next two years.

Announced in 2020 by a consortium that includes Meta, Telecom Egypt, China Mobile International, MTN GlobalConnect, Orange, STC, Vodafone, and WIOCC, the 2Africa cable, which will circle the African continent is, at 45,000km, among the world’s largest subsea cable projects. It will connect 33 countries with 46 landing points across Africa, Europe, and Asia when it is complete.

Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN) is responsible for manufacturing and deploying the 16-fibre pair, 180Tbps cable, which is due for completion in 2024. 2Africa has already landed at a number of points in Europe and Africa as well as Saudi Arabia through the Pearls extension, which will also take the cable to Mumbai in India.

Four data center moves in four geographies to catch up with: … [visit site to read more]

Four bits of technology upgrades tapping three vendors both local and international over the last few days: … [visit site to read more]

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For today’s interview, we have a return visit from Accenture’s Andrew Walker whom we last talked to just about two years ago.  Andrew’s role has expanded from a focus on North America to where he now leads Accenture’s Global Communications & Media consulting division.  Andrew has conversations with players from across the sector regularly, developing strategies for business transformation in the age of cloud infrastructure.  That puts him in a good position to see things from an outside perspective. … [visit site to read more]

There’s been good news recently for South Africa’s telecommunications sector, with Cassava Technologies and AWS announcing major investments and Vodacom saying it plans to enhance its network spending.

Integrated technology company Cassava Technologies has pledged a total of R4.5 billion (about US$248 million) in investment in South Africa through its business units Liquid Intelligent Technologies, Africa Data Centres and Distributed Power Africa. 

Cassava’s investment pledge comprises key projects, including the expansion of the Liquid Intelligent Technologies fibre network, the extension of Africa Data Centres’ capacity and footprint, enhanced cloud and cybersecurity capacity, and the rollout of clean, renewable energy by Distributed Power Africa in South Africa.

Cassava says its investments will contribute towards positioning South Africa as an attractive investment destination and enable greater inclusion of all South Africans consistent with Cassava’s vision of a digitally connected future that leaves no African behind.

Meanwhile, cloud services provider Amazon Web Services says it will invest up to another R14.8 billion (US$815.6 million) in its cloud infrastructure in South Africa by 2029 on top of the R15.6 billion (US$860 million) it has already invested in the country, notably in Cape Town, where it has built a data centre region.

The total investment, says AWS, aims to contribute R68 billion (US$3.75 billion) to South Africa’s GDP and support more than 5,700 jobs.

Finally, operator Vodacom says it will spend at least R12 billion (US$661 million) per year on average on its network in South Africa over the next five years, well above the average R10 billion US$551 million per year it has spent in the past five years.

As with a similar announcement recently from MTN, much of this is likely to be connected to ensuring network resilience against theft, vandalism and power cuts.

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