Liquid Intelligent Technologies Deploys its First World-Class Overland Fibre Network in the DRC

Liquid Intelligent Technologies has deployed its world-class fibre network in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). This expansion connects millions of DRC citizens and thousands of businesses to the ‘One Africa’ broadband network totalling over 73 000 kms across the continent. Furthermore, Kinshasa and most major cities in the DRC are now connected directly to the world, linking to such cities as London, San Francisco, and Singapore, and many other global economic hubs.

Our terrestrial fibre network connects Muanda, a town lying on the west Atlantic coast of the country, to cities as far as Cape Town in South Africa, Dar es Salam in Tanzania and Lubumbashi. This is a first for the country, as no operator currently offers such a seamless link across the continent. The DRC route is part of the first-ever complete East to West network on the African continent, offering low latency, high bandwidth fibre connectivity and high availability.

In East-West corridors, Liquid has reaffirmed its place as Africa’s premier digital services and infrastructure provider by recently deploying a new 2500 km long-haul fibre network in the DRC. With this deployment, Liquid Intelligent Technologies now offers digital services and internet communications over most of the African continent.

“The completion of this project is part of the strategic vision to connect the African continent to the rest of the world,” said Michel Hebert, CEO Liquid Intelligent Technologies DRC. “This fibre deployment not only has the potential to transform the economy of the country, but we are also bringing access to scalable state-of-the-art digital and cloud services that will enable them to connect to the global digital economy.”

High-speed internet access across the DRC has been almost non-existent for the past decade, ranking 145th globally for internet access. A new extensive fibre infrastructure built by Liquid Intelligent Technologies will empower the local economy to step out of the shadows and embrace the digital transformation that has overtaken the rest of the continent.

For the first time, customers have more choices and greater redundancy available to them due to the creation of these terrestrial routes, which also cut latency across Africa from 250s to approximately 50ms. Part of a more extensive fibre network connecting East to West, the combination of the North Route, middle Route and the South Route, together with access to all submarine cables landing on the African shores, has allowed Liquid to create an unparalleled network for customers.

“At Liquid, we pride ourselves in ensuring all our customers are catered to, irrespective of the size of the business or household. For the first time, people living in the DRC will no longer only rely on expensive mobile broadband. In addition to Cloud services, through our strategic partnerships, we will also provide our customers with a suite of cybersecurity tools and platforms to safeguard personal data, corporate information and businesses themselves”, added Beston Tshinsele, Executive Chairman DRC, Liquid Intelligent Technologies.

This fibre deployment will also have the fastest and lowest costs way for global telecommunications operators, OTT’s, ISP’s, and enterprises to link their communications to other African countries from Kinshasa to Cape Town. Beyond connectivity, this deployment offers people in the DRC access to Africa’s cloud and other digital services that are poised to form the backbone of the DRC’s digital economy.

Liquid will connect the DRC with a high-quality Optical Ground Wireline (OPGW), with capacities from 1G up to multiple 100G’s. This line offers greater redundancy at speeds and access to high-speed broadband, which provides the foundations for digital growth and innovation across the country.

In 2009, Liquid laid its first fibre in the ground and for the last two decades, the organisation has been a pan-African telecommunications company that brought high-speed fibre connectivity to numerous African countries. With the unveiling of the new strategic direction from a pure telco to a technology company, Liquid will now meet its customers changing demands for tailor-made digital solutions. Not only will Liquid continue to bring connectivity to Africa, but the organisation will enable small and large businesses, enterprises and government entities to increase their competitiveness within their sector through digital solutions catering to their individual needs.