MAIN ONE, SEACOM GET 'BEST PAN AFRICAN INITIATIVE' @ AFRICACOM

Two privately funded and open-access based African submarine fibre optic cable systems, Main One and Seacom, were awarded 'Best Pan African Initiative' at the AfricaCom Awards 2011 ceremony held in Cape Town, South Africa, on Wednesday November 9, 2011.

The award recognises an initiative taken by an organisation or a group of organisations to improve telecommunications services at a regional or continental level.

MainOne CEO, Funke Opeke, noted that through this partnership, Main One and Seacom had extended their individual cable systems to the opposite coasts of Africa without the efforts required to construct brand new routes.

'The ability to connect the east and west coast of the continent directly results in improved throughput but also provides a system around much of the continent, which provides improved redundancy for telecommunications operators.'

Commenting on the award, Mark Simpson, Seacom CEO, said: 'We are honoured to be recognised once again for our efforts in continuously extending pan-African connectivity by investing in infrastructure, products and services that meet the continent's insatiable demand for bandwidth.

'This partnership shows our determination to find viable ways to extend our system with partners, who share our vision of building the African Internet on an open and equitable basis.'

Main One and Seacom announced in May 2011 that they had interconnected their West and East African cable systems to launch capacity services from PoP to PoP, from a STM-1 level and above. This partnership extends the Main One and Seacom networks to create a system that offers connection between any Seacom and Main One PoPs all around Africa.