The Construction and Maintenance Agreement (C&MA) of ACE submarine cable project was signed on Saturday June 5th, 2010. An official ceremony was held at the Eiffel Tower in Paris, with the presence of government Ministers and high-ranking official representatives of several African countries, NPCA (formerly NEPAD), ECOWAS and the World Bank.

ACE connectivity will become a key driver of Africa’s social and economic growth.

The nineteen (19) signatories to the C&MA are Baharicom Development Company, Cable Consortium of Liberia, Companhia Santomense de Telecomunicações, Côte d’Ivoire Telecom, Expresso Telecom Group, France Telecom, Gambia Telecommunications Company, International Mauritania Telecom, Office Congolais des Postes et Télécommunications, Orange Cameroun, Orange Guinée, Orange Mali, Orange Niger, PT Comunicações, Republic of Equatorial Guinea, Republic of Gabon, Sierra Leone Cable Company, Sonatel and Sotelgui.

In its planned configuration, the 17,000 km-long fiber optic cable stretching from France to South Africa will be operational in the first half of 2012. It will connect 23 countries, either directly for coastal countries or indirectly through terrestrial links for landlocked countries Mali and Niger.

This will be the first international submarine cable to land in Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, The Gambia, Guinea, Liberia, Mauritania, Namibia, Sao Tome and Principe and Sierra Leone.

Other countries benefiting from the ACE project include Angola, Benin, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, France, Gabon, Ghana, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Portugal, Senegal, South Africa and Spain (Tenerife).

The ACE system will deploy wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) technology, which is currently the most advanced for submarine cables. With WDM, cable capacity can be increased without additional submarine work. With an overall potential capacity of 5.12 Tbps, the system will support the new 40 Gbps technology at day one, which will accommodate tomorrow's ultra-broadband networks.

The ACE project represents an overall investment of around USD 700 million for the consortium. Alcatel-Lucent has been awarded the supply contract of the system.

ACE will complement existing submarine cables (SAT-3/WASC/SAFE, SEA-ME-WE.3, ATLANTIS 2, etc.) and will offer the West African coastal region excellent connectivity to telecommunications networks in Europe, the Americas and Asia.

ACE submarine cable configuration

1. Penmarch, France 2. Lisbon, Portugal 3. Tenerife, Spain 4. Nouakchott, Mauritania 5. Dakar, Senegal 6. Banjul, The Gambia 7. Conakry, Guinea 8. Freetown, Sierra Leone 9. Monrovia, Liberia 10. Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire 11. Accra, Ghana 12. Cotonou, Benin 13. Lagos, Nigeria 14. Kribi, Cameroon 15. Bata, Equatorial Guinea 16. Libreville, Gabon 17. Santana, Sao Tome and Principe 18. Muanda, Democratic Republic of Congo 19. Luanda, Angola 20. Swakopmund, Namibia 21. Cape Town, South Africa