RCN to bridge East and West

Six Middle Eastern telcos have signed a construction and maintenance agreement to build the Regional Cable Network (RCN), a multi-terabit cable system stretching from the UAE through Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria and on into Europe. RCN will provide robust bandwidth connectivity for the region’s growing broadband community and will provide greater diversity for each of the operators. Etisalat (UAE), Mobily (Saudi Arabia), Jordan Telecom (Jordan), Zain-Mada coalition (Jordan) and Syrian Telecom (Syria), together with other European partners, will join forces to build the 4,000km diversified cable system. Mohamed Omran, chairman of Etisalat said: ‘RCN is an important development in the history of the internet in the Middle East. It is the first terabit, terrestrial cable that connects Europe with the region and will provide extra capacity to help fulfil the expected future need which will be fuelled by broadband growth, multimedia applications and video. We are keen to support this initiative which will no doubt cater for the future needs of the telecom sector.’