Etisalat Enhances International Connectivity to UAE with AAE-1 Submarine Cable System

Abu Dhabi, 3 July 2017: Etisalat today announced the Asia-Africa-Europe-1 (AAE-1) undersea cable, the largest global submarine cable system bringing additional international capacity to UAE connecting Europe and Far East.

With this announcement, the submarine cable system is ready and will have the first commercial traffic loaded running into the system. Etisalat is an AAE-1 consortium member and has played a significant role in this submarine cable system with Etisalat’s ‘Smarthub’ becoming a strategic terminal point in the UAE. 

AAE-1 (Asia-Africa-Europe-1) is a unique next generation cable system ever built, the first next generation cable system to link all major Asian, African, Middle Eastern and European nations via the lowest latency subsea route.

The submarine cable system is launched in partnership with 18 other global carriers such as China Unicom (Myanmar), CIL-HyalRoute(Cambodia), Djibouti Telecom, GT5L-Global Transit (Malaysia and Singapore), VTC-Metfone (Cambodia) , Mobily (Saudi Arabia),  Omantel, Ooredoo, Oteglobe (Greece), PCCW Global (Hong Kong), PTCL (Pakistan), Reliance Jio (India) , Retelit (Italy) Telecom Egypt, TeleYemen, TOT (Thailand) , Viettel (Vietnam) and VNPT (Vietnam)  and Etisalat. 

AAE-1 will serve international carriers, CDNs (Content Delivery Networks) and Enterprise businesses from UAE and the region apart from meeting the ever growing demand of internet users. AAE-1 also helps Etisalat in expanding its geographical footprint and establishing PoPs (Point of Presence)  in new markets by having a direct low latency connectivity to countries such as Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand and Myanmar. 

Ali Amiri, the Group Chief Carrier and Wholesale Officer, Etisalat said, “Etisalat is proud to bring AAE-1 into service increasing our international capacity from UAE to Asian and European regions. AAE-1’s launch will not only provide additional protection and diversity to existing routes, but also enable more countries to be reached and other parties to access Etisalat’s SmartHub products and services”

AAE-1 cable system deploys 100Gbps transmission technology, with a minimum design capacity of 40 terabits. It is a next generation subsea cable that lands in Fujairah will act as a high speed gateway connecting UAE to Hong Kong and Singapore with multiple Onward-Connectivity options in Europe featuring unique landing points in Greece, Italy and France.