Dubai-based telecom major, Etisalat, said it has launched a high capacity fibre optic submarine cable that stretches from India to Europe, in collaboration with eight other global telecom players, including Bharti Airtel and Tata Communications. The 13,000-km three pair fiber optic cable named IMEWE (India-Middle East-Western Europe), has a design capacity of 3.84 terabits per second, connecting India to Italy and France via Middle East, with landings enroute in Pakistan, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Lebanon, Etisalat said in a statement.

The IMEWE consortium comprises of nine major telecom companies – Bharti Airtel (India), Etisalat (UAE), France Telecom-Orange (France), OGERO (Lebanon), Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (Pakistan), Saudi Telecom Company STC,(Saudi Arabia), Telecom Egypt (Egypt), Telecom Italia Sparkle (Italy), and Tata Communications (India), it added.

IMEWE is the third major submarine cable operational between India and Europe after SMW3 and SMW4 and is expected to play a major role in meeting ever growing bandwidth requirement of Indian sub-continent and Middle East to Europe and beyond.