Du becomes latest telco to seal cable landing deal with GBI

Qatar-based submarine cable operator Gulf Bridge International (GBI) has announced the signing of an agreement with UAE telecoms operator Du to land its submarine fibre-optic cable at Du’s newly built Fujairah Cable Landing Station, the Gulf Times reports. The deal forms the latest in a series of Landing Party Agreements that the Doha-based cableco has already signed this year; as reported by CommsUpdate, GBI sealed a deal with Iraq Telecommunications and Post Company (IPTC) in January and Vodafone Qatar only last week for the establishment of landing stations. Scheduled to launch in 2011 and designed to operate for up to 25 years, the GBI cable system will connect all the Gulf countries via a core ring and provide onward connectivity to Europe and Asia. With a design capacity of up to 5Tbps on certain sections, the cable will have the capability to meet the rapid growth in demand that has been forecast for traffic originating and terminating in the Gulf. The UAE will be able to benefit from greater connectivity and access to more capacity, which in turn will further stimulate demand for higher bandwidth services.