SEAS sells Seychelles internet on the sea shore

The Seychelles East Africa System (SEAS) fibre-optic undersea cable has landed in Seychelles at Beau Vallon Bay, heralded by the country’s president James Michel who thanked partners in the project including ICT secretary and head of the cable’s owner Submarine Cable System (SCS), Benjamin Choppy, Cable & Wireless Seychelles, Airtel Seychelles, Zantel (on the Tanzanian side of the link) and main supplier Alcatel-Lucent, as well as financiers European Investment Bank and the African Development Bank. The president added that: ‘In the coming weeks, Cable & Wireless and Airtel will have the great challenge of delivering faster internet services to our homes and workplaces.’ The 1,900km route between the island nation and the African mainland (at Dar-es-Salaam) will enable high speed direct access to the internet and cheaper bandwidth; the 115-isle Seychelles archipelago has so far relied on expensive satellite connections for its domestic and international communications needs, notes TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database.