Race is on to lay undersea fiber optic cable on eastern Africa coast

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The countries involved are: Angola, Botswana, Burundi, Comoros, Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Madagascar, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somalia, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe. South Africa, Mauritius and Djibouti also are involved in the four projects, though they are already connected to other undersea cables.

Kenya, one of the most dynamic economies in the group, wants to drive down telecommunications costs to tap into the multibillion dollar outsourcing industry and make Kenya an information technology hub, said Bitange Ndemo, the country's information and communications permanent secretary.

Kenya's nascent call center business has grown from employing 200 people last year to 3,000 this year, despite relying on expensive satellite-based communications.

To get more companies to give their business to Kenyan call centers, the country needs to increase its bandwidth up to 500 megabits per second by year's end and subsidize the cost until a submarine fiber-optic cable is working, Ndemo said.

For Kenya, the fiber couldn't come fast enough.

The Eastern Africa Submarine Cable Systems project has been held up because of negotiations over its ownership and funding, and debate about whether it will be for-profit.

Worried the project was taking too long, Kenya teamed up with the United Arab Emirates telecommunications company Etisalat, and set up the East African Marine Systems, or TEAMS, project in November. Kenya will finance 40 percent of the project, Etisalat 20 percent, and still to be identified private Kenyan investors the remaining 40 percent.

Ndemo said that the government will soon invite bids for a company to lay the cable between Kenya's Indian Ocean port of Mombasa and Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates and have Kenyans connected to it by March 2008.

Kenya also remains a participant in the Eastern Africa Submarine Cable Systems project.

Meanwhile, a private company -- Kenya Data Networks -- is involved in a third initiative and is negotiating with a subsidiary of the Indian conglomerate, Reliance Group, to lay a cable between Mombasa and near the coast of Yemen. Kenya Data Networks Managing Director Kai Wulff said that his company would not invest in laying cable, only guarantee clients for it.

The most recent project is led by U.S.-based Herakles Telecom. In April, the company commissioned a survey of the Indian Ocean and expects its cable to be in place and in use by March 2009. Herlihy, Herakles' vice president, declined to identify the private investors who make up the company.

He said the company will not only be laying an undersea cable but also connect major urban areas of Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, South Africa and Tanzania. The undersea cable and inland networks, called SEACOM, will cost US$300 million, Herlihy said.

''Laying our cable will lead to a low price, high-demand market and change the price paradigm in the region,'' Herlihy said.