New West Coast cable gets go-ahead

@JohnsonCT is right. What the news about MainOne fails to mention is that their aspirations have been cut in half from a 14,000km cable from Portugal to SA to a 7,000km cable that only goes as far as Lagos. Still good news for Africa, just less so for South Africa. The way things currently stand, West Africa (with the ACE, WACS, MainOne, and Glo1 cables) may ultimately have the largest bandwidth capacity on the continent.
 
rpm said:
Better broadband services and lower prices are brought about by competition. This is nothing new and the OECD’s Taylor Reynolds commented on how SA’s broadband situation can be improved: “Countries with strong competition quickly drop prices and increase broadband speeds.” Taylor Reynolds, OECD.

This means that every bit of competition will help and should be welcomed. I noticed that some of the more negative members say that ‘nothing will drive down bandwidth prices’ and the like, but the fact is that international bandwidth prices have already significantly reduced because of SEACOM – even before it became operational! The same will happen with other systems, so I for one welcome all these initiatives.
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But I thought this was South Africa? Don't telecoms companies get together in one big room and decide how to screw the customer? "If we all have to lower our prices we all lose profit and can't sponsor cricket/rugby/tennis/soccer/stadiums etc!". Artificially high prices is the way to do business in SA. Its happened with bread, medicines, cell phones and banks.
 
This is great news. Things are looking good going forward. We should start seeing a drop in Telecommunication costs. Its quite logical with all the infrastructure development currently happening that there will be competition and a drop in prices. If there is not, then we have a SERIOUS problem.
 
rpm said:
the fact is that international bandwidth prices have already significantly reduced because of SEACOM – even before it became operational!
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I seem to distinctively remember that telkom didnt lower bandwidth prices last year?

But that's besides the point, another line is more than welcome

Did i get it right and they say it'll come online for us sometime in 2010?
 
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Solution

Get a couple of tug-boats, start pushing of the West-Coast, turn Africa around, so that Cape Town end up just south of France.

THEN we hire a fishing trawler, everybody buys his own tolletjie fibre cable, and we lay it out to spain.

How is that for out of the box th.....ag ja, talking nonsense, I know. Telkom wil surely get a bigger tug to turn as back.................
 
do not lock oneself into any longterm contract anytime now till desember
 
Main one is the brown cable running down the Western Side of Africa...
3425536138_fd95ddcb43_d.jpg


Apparently they have already begun laying the cable!
http://www.telegeography.com/cu/article.php?article_id=27161

Here is their website...
http://www.mainonecable.com/
 
So what are the cables landing here in order of date landing?

Seacom - 2009
and then?
 
JohnsonCT said:
Is it just me, or does this cable look like it isn't making its way all the way down the west coast?
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You were just the only one that read the article and comprehended it, the rest of the people here had clouded visions due to excessive optimism & euphoria because they have been drinking the Kool-Aid to long!

The cable is only 7000km long and will not reach SA, not in phase 1 anyway. Sub Saharan Africa is possible if more companies sign up.

10/10 for your comprehension squire ;)
 
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rpm said:
but the fact is that international bandwidth prices have already significantly reduced because of SEACOM – even before it became operational!
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Er, well the real fact to consider then would be that we haven't seen any significant (mostly none at all) in a drop of international bandwidth prices for us. So where is that significant reducing going?

Probably the same place that most of the bigger reductions will go with newer cables. But I'm still sure we'll see some improvement.
 
Just remember that every African company moving to a new cable means less traffic on SAT3. Less traffic on SAT3 means lower prices for us...
 
rpm said:
Better broadband services and lower prices are brought about by competition. This is nothing new and the OECD’s Taylor Reynolds commented on how SA’s broadband situation can be improved: “Countries with strong competition quickly drop prices and increase broadband speeds.” Taylor Reynolds, OECD.

This means that every bit of competition will help and should be welcomed. I noticed that some of the more negative members say that ‘nothing will drive down bandwidth prices’ and the like, but the fact is that international bandwidth prices have already significantly reduced because of SEACOM – even before it became operational! The same will happen with other systems, so I for one welcome all these initiatives.
Click to expand...

But the fact is that fact is still fiction to all of us...

Truth is we can't expect to have lower prices in the short term because of blah blah blah....... and please do not say I'm being negative, its the fact, we just had another one of those articles yesterday with iburst CEO saying exactly that, and just about everyone b4 that.

so yes, maybe it will be our grandchildren that reap the benefit.
 
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