SEACOM cable wins Africa Investor award.

The SEACOM project to provide east and southern Africa with cheap broadband internet connections has won several awards from the UK-based investment and research group Africa Investor. Its main sponsor, New York-based international development group Herakles Telecom, has been named sponsor of the year, while its financing company Nedbank has been awarded the ICT/Telecoms deal of the year and South African law firm Bell Dewar and Hall has received the award for best legal advisors of the year. The awards are in recognition of the importance of the project for infrastructure development in Africa.

The SEACOM cable is being laid by US-based company Tyco Telecommunications at an estimated cost of US$650 million and will link South Africa, Mozambique, Madagascar, Tanzania, Kenya and Ethiopia to India and Europe. Work has already begun on cable landing stations in Maputo and Mombasa and the first of three ships has arrived in Egypt in readiness to lay cables in the Red Sea. If all goes to plan the facility should be ready in June 2009.

SEACOM is one of three submarine cable projects linking Africa