Charis Chrisna
TechInAfrica – On June 28th, Google announced on their Cloud Blog that the search engine giant will host their own private subsea cable for the third time, named Equiano. Following the success of their first two private cables, Dunant and Curie, Google expects Equiano to run from South Africa all the way to Portugal, essentially connecting Africa and Europe together. The lengths of Equiano are also projected to start from Western Europe to Nigeria as its first node point—ranging along the west coastlines of the continent. Aside from that and South Africa, it is also planned for the subsea cable to expand to more countries as the project triumphs in the future.
Contrary to the first two private cables that use conventional wavelength-level switching, Equiano will be the first to incorporate optical switching at the fiber-pair level—ultimately making all connections to be established faster, as well as simplifying the allocation of cable capacity. Furthermore, because this project is fully funded and operated by Google, the flexibility of the cable allows engineers and developers alike to install additional networks into various regions of Africa stated in the first paragraph.
The first phase of the project which connects Portugal and South Africa is expected to finish in 2021. Google is also looking forward to partner up with official and licensed contributors in order to manifest the cable system into more regions on Africa.
Alternatively, you can visit their official web page by clicking here.
Equiano is named after Olaudah Equiano, a slave-turned-abolitionist and writer who revolutionized the anti-slavery movement in the 18th century Nigeria. Worked as a seafarer, Olaudah often operated with ship captains and merchants, all while learning literature at an unprecedented rate. His best-selling book, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano told readers about his life as a slave and how the public opinion regarded the slave trade.
Source: cloud.google.com
