High-speed connectivity provider Paratus Group announced it has completed the Maputo-Johannesburg optical fiber link via Eswatini.

The 750 km link, which will serve as additional redundancy to its pan-African fiber network, will not only connect to the Trans-Kalahari Fiber (TKF) route that already extends across various countries in southern Africa but will also be the second east-west route completed by the operator after the Swakopmund - Dar es Salaam link in August 2019, linking Namibia to Tanzania.

“This comes after months of meticulous planning and significant delays owing to the global Covid-19 pandemic. This week, we were able to commence with link testing and the first live traffic traversed the link. Before activating this shorter route, the majority of traffic to Maputo would need to go through Mtinzini on either the Seacom or Eastern Africa Submarine Cable System (EASSY) cable systems. Latency is halved from 18 ms to 9 ms,” said Rolf Mendelsohn, Paratus Group’s chief technical officer.

For this new route, Paratus Group says it has decided to deploy the latest Infinera coherent technology, operating at wavelengths up to 100GB. Barney Harmse (pictured), CEO of Paratus Group, said this quality investment is another demonstration of his company’s commitment to investing in Africa, despite the difficult economic conditions. “The Covid-19 pandemic has placed tremendous pressure on various economies and we simply cannot allow this to stand in the way of development of Africa as a whole,” he said.