Nexans enters intercontinental fibre optic project connecting Brazil to Cameroon

Nexans has completed a 6,000km link across the South Atlantic Ocean, to help meet the growing demand for high speed broadband in Africa and South America. The company manufactured and successfully tested the cables for the South Atlantic Inter Link (SAIL) project.

As a phase II of Cameroon’s National Broadband Network development (‘NBNII’), the SAIL project will link Cameroon to Brazil. Nexans has played a critical role in the project by manufacturing the cables, based on its second-generation unrepeatered technology. The link comprises four fibre pairs, each with a bandwidth of 100 Gbit/s. Phase I, the Nigeria-Cameroon Cable System, was delivered to Camtel and China Unicom back in 2015.

Earlier this year, customer representatives from Huawei Marine Networks and the end customer Camtel and China Unicom were present when the final System Acceptance Test (SAT) for Phase 2 was successfully accomplished at Nexans facilities in Rognan, Norway.

Kevin Zhang, project director at Huawei Marine Networks said: ‘We are very satisfied with Nexan’s performance in the work of SAIL cable manufacturing, as well as integration, and look forward to cooperation with Nexans in near future.’

Added Krister Granlie, executive vice president, submarine telecom and special cables, Nexans added: ‘Producing Nexans’ first transatlantic cable is a significant milestone in our continuous development program to add value for our customers, based on a skilled and experienced team and the creation of effective working partnerships.’

The submarine fibre optic cable link between Brazil and Cameroon will be operational at the end of the third quarter of 2018.