Paratus express route from Johannesburg to Europe goes live

Paratus Group has announced the launch of the fastest fibre-express route from Johannesburg to Europe. Using Infinera FlexILS and GX Series DWDM equipment, latency on the new route is just 123 milliseconds, and the state-of-the-art Infinera equipment can support wavelengths of up to 800 gigabytes.

The news comes as Paratus, the pan-African telecommunications group, has just completed its 1 890 kilometre fibre link between Johannesburg, via Botswana, to Swakopmund, which connects with the Paratus-landed Equiano subsea cable that runs from Namibia to Lisbon and on to London and the rest of Europe.

The new Paratus express route offers network operators an unequalled opportunity to elevate their capacity and redundancy, where resilience and high-speed performance come as standard. This guarantees smooth data flow and fewer interruptions of service. Paratus is the landing partner for the Equiano subsea cable in Namibia, which offers an alternative route out of South Africa and mitigates against possible fibre outages between Johannesburg and Cape Town.

'The best'

The news also comes at a time when network disruptions abound in Africa, particularly after recent subsea cable breaks, and gives network operators an alternative high speed and resilient connection.

Paratus Group chief commercial officer Martin Cox said the new fibre-express route uniquely combines local expertise with global reach.

“As a steadfast partner with pan-African expertise, we offer unrivalled wholesale capacity solutions for network operators. Because we understand the unique connectivity needs of the various regions, we have tailored our solutions to meet their specific requirements – culminating in this unique express route, we can now offer carriers and operators a diverse and unequalled transmission route to Europe. It’s simply the best.”