Page 55 - SAMENA Trends - August 2020

ARTICLE SAMENA TRENDS

ARTICLE

Investing to Bring the Belt and Road to Life

China Mobile International Limited (“CMI”) is investing globally in
infrastructure, like the extensive 2Africa subsea cable, that will enhance

connectivity along the Belt and Road and help the telecoms sector and
the businesses and consumers it serves grasp new opportunities.

The Belt and Road Initiative is a bold data centres and cloud infrastructure, CMI when it will supersede the total combined
plan to promote communication and is building the capability to provide high- capacity of all subsea cables serving
cooperation between Asia, the Middle quality communications services and Africa today, with a design capacity of up
East, Europe and Africa. Initiated by China solutions to people all along the Belt and to 180Tbps on key parts of the system.
in 2013, it is creating economic corridors Road. “We are committed to a digital future
that touch more than 138 countries. where telecommunications is a bridge that To enhance capacity, the 2Africa cable
The idea is to build infrastructure that promotes the flow of people, capital and will implement a new technology, SDM₁
promotes connectivity through trade, goods in a more connected world.” said from Alcatel Submarine Networks,
investment and cultural exchange. And Dr. Li Feng, Chairman and Chief Executive allowing deployment of up to 16 fibre pairs
telecommunications is a key part of it. Officer of CMI. instead of eight. It will also incorporate
optical switching technology for flexible
As the China Mobile subsidiary responsible Extensive global footprint: 2Africa and bandwidth management and increase
for the network operator’s international beyond subsea cable burial depth by 50%, avoiding
business, CMI continues to invest and CMI has an extensive global footprint of areas known for subsea disturbance, in
innovate to extend its network resources more than 70 submarine and terrestrial order to help ensure high availability.
so that companies and communities can cable systems, including nine self-built
benefit from the Belt and Road vision. subsea cables. This enables seamless
connections within and between Asia Growing data centre network: new U.K. hub
Through its investments in cable systems, Pacific, the Middle East and Africa, the Customer demand for connectivity,
Indian Ocean region and Europe, with links cloud and content delivery solutions has
Through its investments in to more than 300 cities in 31 provinces and continued to soar between Asia Pacific
cable systems, data centres regions throughout Mainland China. and Europe and also within the Middle
East and Africa. Complementing its cable
and cloud infrastructure, Among CMI’s recent investments is the network, CMI is also building a global data

CMI is building the 2Africa subsea cable being developed by a centre network to support closer ties for
businesses operating in the Belt and Road
global consortium to substantially enhance
capability to provide high- connectivity across Africa and the Middle region. It opened its first data centre in
quality communications East. One of the largest subsea projects Europe late last year, with a purpose-built
U.K. facility that serves as an International
ever undertaken, the 37,000-kilometre
services and solutions to cable will connect 23 countries in Africa, Network Exchange hub, an Internet Data
people all along the Belt the Middle East and Europe and extend Centre and a point of presence (PoP) for
and Road. to Asia via major Europe-to-Asia subsea CMI’s Cloud Connect platform.
cables. It is due to go live in 2023/24,

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