Page 58 - SAMENA Trends - June-August 2021

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Expansion of 2Africa Subsea Cable System to the Gulf, Pakistan and India

The 2Africa consortium, comprised of Seychelles, Comoros Islands, Angola, and a available to service providers at carrier-
China Mobile International, Facebook, new landing to south-east Nigeria. 2Africa, neutral data centers or open-access cable
MTN GlobalConnect, Orange, stc, Telecom which will be the largest subsea cable landing stations on a fair and equitable
Egypt, Vodafone and WIOCC, announced project in the world, will deliver faster, more basis, encouraging and supporting
today the addition of a new branch to reliable internet service to each country the development of a healthy internet
the 2Africa cable. The branch will extend where it lands. Communities that rely on ecosystem. Marine surveys completed for
2Africa’s connectivity in to The Gulf region. the internet for services from education to most of the cable and Cable manufacturing
The Gulf branch has been named 2Africa healthcare, and business will experience is underway The 2Africa consortium has
Pearls. It will land at four locations in Saudi the economic and social benefits that made considerable progress in planning
Arabia, Jeddah, Yanbu, Duba and Haql, come from this increased connectivity. and preparing for the deployment of the
going on to land in Oman, UAE (Fujairah & Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN) has cable extension, which is expected to ‘go
Abu Dhabi), Bahrain, Qatar, and Kuwait as been selected to deploy the new branches, live’ late 2023. Most of the subsea route
it extends into The Gulf. The new branch, which will increase the number of 2Africa survey activity is now complete. ASN
2Africa Pearls, will also connect Pakistan landings to 46 locations “stations” in 33 has started manufacturing the cable and
and India to the 2Africa Cable System. The countries, further improving connectivity building repeater units in its factories in
new branch joins the recently announced into the Gulf countries. As with other Calais and Greenwich to deploy the first
extension to the Canary Islands, the 2Africa cable landings, capacity will be segments in 2022.

GCC Projected to Have 62 million 5G Mobile Subscriptions By 2026

Ericsson predicts that there will be 62 GCC data. “The report shows that we are statistics from GCC markets for the first
million 5G mobile subscriptions in the in the next phase of 5G, with accelerating time where local digital initiatives are
Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) by the roll-outs and coverage expansion in accelerating both technological innovation
end of 2026. The forecast, which features pioneer markets such as the United Arab and expected 5G uptake. In 2019, GCC
in the twentieth edition of the Ericsson Emirates.” The report states that GCC 5G markets were among the first in the world
Mobility Report, enhances the expectation subscriptions will account for the second to launch commercial 5G services. Driven
that 5G will become the fastest adopted highest 5G market penetration globally by UAE Vision 2021 and digital initiatives
mobile generation. Wojciech Bajda, and will constitute almost three quarters in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) such
vice president and head of Gulf Council of all mobile subscriptions in the region. as Smart Dubai Vision to make the city
Countries at Ericsson Middle East and Additionally, 5G mobile subscriptions paperless and all government transactions
Africa said, “This is a landmark edition will exceed 580 million globally by the 100 percent digitized, 5G is transforming
of the Ericsson Mobility Report. It is the end of 2021, driven by an estimated one the economic and social landscape of
twentieth edition of the Ericsson Mobility million new 5G mobile subscriptions the nation. As one of the key economies
Report and the first to include specific every day. The report features breakout in the GCC, the UAE is supporting the use
and growth of technologies such as 5G in
a region where mobile data consumption
is the highest in the world. According to
the Ericsson Mobility Report, at the end
of 2020, the GCC had the highest average
monthly data traffic per smartphone in
the world, exceeding 18GB. Globally 5G is
expected to surpass a billion subscriptions
two years ahead of the 4G LTE timeline for
the same milestone. Key factors behind
that include China’s earlier commitment
to 5G and the earlier availability and
increasing affordability of commercial 5G
devices. More than 300 5G smartphone
models have already been announced or
launched commercially. This commercial
5G momentum is expected to continue in
coming years, spurred by the enhanced
role of connectivity as a key component of
post-COVID-19 economic recovery.
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