Being one of Google’s six private cable systems, the Equiano submarine cable system will lead to the creation of 1.6 million jobs and the data prices will reduce by 16-21 percent.

September 29, 2022

Google has officially launched its Equiano submarine cable in Cape Town, South Africa. The cable system, which connects Western Europe to South Africa, entailed a total investment of USD 1 billion. The name of the cable system is a tribute to Olaudah Equiano, a Nigerian writer and abolitionist.

The undersea internet cable marks the highest-ever capacity cable in Africa and is spread over 15,000 km from Portugal to South Africa. The cable system is equipped with 12 fibre pairs and a design capacity of 150 Terabytes Per Second (TBPS).

Watch: Cable & Wire Fair Show Reel

With nine branching points, the Equiano subsea cable was announced in June 2019. It was launched with the aim to improve connectivity, resilience, and latency in the continent. The cable stretches along the western coast of Africa from Portugal and has landed in Melkbosstrand, Cape Town.

The branching units/points are the regions at which additional landing stations can be built. There are several branching units along the way to Cape Town that connect other countries, including Namibia, and Togo, with plans for links to Nigeria, DR Congo, and the islands of Saint Helena.

Also Read: Google to launch Topaz – the First Subsea Cable Linking Canada and Asia

It is one of Google’s six private cable systems, and the nineteenth subsea cable system in which the technology company has invested. According to a report commissioned by Google, the Equiano cable system will lead to the creation of 1.6 million employment opportunities. Moreover, the report has also predicted that the cable will lead to data prices dropping between 16 to 21 percent.

The cable is equipped with space-division multiplexing (SDM) – a novel technology in submarine cables, which has also been integrated in Google’s Dunant cable, which links France and the USA.