The US$700m Africa Coast to Europe (Ace) project to lay a high-capacity, 5,1Tbit/s submarine cable between France and SA is making good progress, with news late this week that the system has landed in Côte d’Ivoire in West Africa.

The cable, which is co-owned by France Telecom/Orange, is expected to be ready for commercial service in the second half of 2012 and will be the second new cable serving the entire west coast of Africa after the West Africa Cable System, which is expected to start carrying traffic commercially in the first quarter of next year.

The two new systems are the first to go live along the route since the Sat-3 system went live nearly 10 years ago.

The Ace cable is landing in Côte d’Ivoire in partnership with Côte d’Ivoire Telecom. Orange says the cable-laying ship Ile de Sein has completed laying of the cable up to Abidjan, just five weeks after it came ashore in Brittany in France.

The cable system, when it’s completed, will be 17 000km long and will serve 21 countries. The cable will be able to carry the equivalent of 370m simultaneous telephone calls and 75 000 television channels. — Staff reporter, TechCentral