Seven Middle Eastern operators have announced US$500m plans to build a fibre network that could serve as a gateway to the internet for two billion people in the region.
The consortium of operators behind the so-called Regional Cable Network (RCN) project…
Seven Middle Eastern operators have announced US$500m plans to build a fibre network that could serve as a gateway to the internet for two billion people in the region.
The consortium of operators behind the so-called Regional Cable Network (RCN) project includes Turkcell, Superonline, Etisalat, Mobily, Jordan Telecom, Mada-Zain Consortium and Syria Telecommunications Establishment.
From Fujairah in the UAE, RCN’s 7,750km cable will pass through Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, Amman in Jordan, and Tartous in Syria to eventually reach Turkey’s Istanbul to cover the entire Gulf region.
“The region’s governments are encouraging investment in new technologies to bolster the performance of their national economies,” said RCN project consortium chairman Ali Amiri, who is also a VP at Etisalat.
“Operators are deploying next-generation networks for both fixed-line and wireless environments which in turn allow an increasing volume of services to be provided to ever more consumers. These factors as well as the growing technical literacy of the local population and availability of rich local content are all driving the demand for ever more capacity.”
The RCN consortium expects the fibre optic line will be operational in the second quarter of 2011.
