SEACOM plans impress Uganda leaders

Uganda government leaders are enthusiastic about the potential opportunities provided by SEACOM, an undersea fiber-optic cable on the eastern seaboard of Africa, after hearing developers of the project explain their business plans.

"They are building a cable, and because they are targeting the hinterland, as government we are interested in knowing what they are doing," said David Turahi, the director of IT at the Ministry of ICT.

SEACOM is a Mauritius-registered initiative. The submarine cable network will link East Africa, South Africa, Europe and Asia. Scheduled to be fully functional in June next year, SEACOM plans to provide high-capacity bandwidth along the East Coast of Africa through South Africa, Mozambique, Madagascar, Tanzania, Kenya and Djibouti and to the rest of the world via landing points in France and India.

SEACOM wants to become a "carriers' carrier" for what it sees as an underserved market. So far, SEACOM has raised money from a number of sources in the U.S., Africa, the Middle East and Europe.

Brian Herlihy, the president of SEACOM, presented its business plans to the Uganda government in Kampala last week.

In his presentation to technology and political leaders, Herlihy said the cost of using the Internet at home and in cyber cafes and offices will significantly drop once SEACOM opens for business.

ICT Minister Ham Mulira said the opening up of another broadband cable will reduce the cost of voice and data transmission in the region by 80 percent. The cables are also expected to create more jobs in the Internet sector, Mulira said.

The monthly cost of satellite links to Internet service providers presently stands at about US$5,000 to $15,000 per month for 2M-bps links. But the target is to reduce the monthly rate to about $45 to $200.

Mulira said the project, and others, are expected to support the creation of 12,000 jobs per year in a minimum of 30 call centers operating on two shifts.

"The call centers cannot operate now because of inadequate bandwidth, limited power supply and the absence of other ICT," Mulira noted.

Eastern Africa has been the only part of the world without submarine cable connectivity, but that bleak situation is now changing with a number of submarine cable initiatives. Beside SEACOM, there is EASSY; the Kenyan government’s TEAMS cable; Uhurunet, under the aegis of the Nepad development organization; and the South African government's Infraco.