A major undersea cable route connecting Western Europe to West and South Africa will receive a significant capacity upgrade from Ciena. The Africa Coast to Europe (ACE) submarine cable consortium selected the vendor to enhance one of its primary pathways, leveraging Ciena's 6500 platform equipped with WaveLogic 6 Extreme (WL6e) technology to push throughput beyond 30 Tb/s.
Spanning 17,000 kilometres and serving 18 landing stations, the ACE system will benefit from a non-disruptive deployment approach. Rather than overhaul the existing setup, Ciena will layer its WL6e technology onto the current submarine line terminal equipment, enabling capacity expansion while avoiding the operational complexity of major traffic rerouting.
Beyond the initial upgrade, Ciena will furnish ongoing maintenance and support services as the ACE consortium anticipates continued growth in data flows between the two continents.
Philippe Recco, President of the ACE Management Committee, framed the enhancement as critical infrastructure: "International routes drive economic growth, digital inclusion, and cloud adoption across Africa, and this upgrade gives regional service providers a high-capacity path that reaches more than 500 million people. Ciena's coherent optical technology and proven Services team give us confidence that we can keep customers connected while meeting expanding bandwidth needs."
Thomas Soerenson, Vice President of Global Subsea at Ciena, emphasised the partnership's scope: "Ciena supports this vital link between Africa and the rest of the world with our subsea deployment expertise and coherent optical innovations. Together, we are expanding existing cable infrastructure and developing a long-term technology roadmap for future growth with minimal operational impact."
