Seacom rejects Nepad as partner
Seacom, the private company that is developing a $600 million (R4.6 billion) undersea cable on the east coast of Africa, will not partner with a cable being developed by 12 African governments until it makes economic sense to its shareholders.
Seacom is set to go live in June next year. It plans to provide companies with access to bandwidth at a lower cost.
Last year the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad) said discussions were under way with companies that were involved in private cables to see if they could support the government-backed Nepad cable instead, or in addition to their current projects.
Yesterday Seacom president Brian Herlihy said that although Seacom supported a "grand cable for Africa", it would not enter into the partnership until the larger solution made sense to shareholders.
The $2 billion Nepad cable, which will compete with Seacom and the East African Submarine Cable System, is yet to start construction.
Herlihy said Seacom could not wait for this initiative as international demand for cables had skyrocketed. But the company had "dynamic" interaction with the South African government.
The group will provide high-capacity bandwidth linking southern and east Africa, Europe and south Asia. Its two fibres will have a capacity of 1.28 terabytes.
The 13 700km project is 25 percent owned by Venfin. Cyril Ramaphosa's Shanduka and Andile Ngcaba's Convergence Partners have 12.5 percent each. Industrial Promotion Services has 26.25 percent and the rest is owned by US-based Herakles Telecom.
Herlihy said Seacom would be cheaper than other fibreoptic or satellite options at R267 per megabit per second per month, compared with R231 000 for satellite.
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