The Medusa Submarine Cable System will extend its reach to Jordan via an agreement with NaiTel, the telecom arm of Jordanian carrier-neutral data centre Aqaba Digital Hub (ADH), to integrate its Coral Bridge cable with Medusa.
The 15-km Coral Bridge cable – which became operational last year – was deployed jointly by NaiTel and Telecom Egypt to provide a direct link between Taba, Egypt, and Aqaba, Jordan.
Under an agreement with NaiTel announced on Thursday, Medusa will establish colocation capacity at ADH, while both companies will integrate Medusa’s subsea infrastructure with NaiTel’s regional and international connectivity network.
This will enable operators and customers connected at ADH to access Medusa’s subsea network and reach Europe directly, while providing an open-access gateway for international connectivity into Jordan and the wider Middle East, said Medusa CEO Norman Albi.
“By combining Medusa’s high-capacity submarine network with NaiTel and ADH’s terrestrial, data centre and subsea infrastructure in Aqaba, we are creating new opportunities for carriers, cloud providers, digital platforms and enterprises to access more diverse and resilient international routes,” he said in a statement.
Eyad Abu Khorma, founder and CEO of Aqaba Digital Hub, added that Jordan is uniquely positioned to serve as a bridge between the Mediterranean and the wider Middle East.
“Our collaboration with Medusa further expands the international connectivity ecosystem we have built in Aqaba, strengthening the links between Europe, North Africa, Jordan and the wider Middle East,” he said. “Medusa’s growing footprint across the Mediterranean, combined with NaiTel and Aqaba Digital Hub’s terrestrial, subsea and data centre infrastructure in Jordan, creates a strong foundation for developing more diversified and resilient international connectivity.”
The 8,760km Medusa system features landing points in Cyprus, France, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, and Spain on the north Mediterranean coast, and Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, and Tunisia on the south coast, with a design capacity of 480 Tbps on 24 fibre pairs.
The cable is being funded by AFR-IX Telecom, Orange and the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF Digital) program.
The France-to-Tunisia route of the Medusa Submarine Cable System – dubbed “ViaTunisia” – went live earlier this year, establishing a new digital link between Europe and North Africa.
AFR-IX Telecom plans to extend the Medusa cable along Africa’s western coastline, and has secured funding from the European Commission and the US Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) to that end.
