Telecom Namibia has joined a multinational consortium of leading telecommunications operators to help fund a multi-million undersea optic fibre cable to be known as West Africa Cable System (WACS).

This follows the signing of a Construction and Maintenance Agreement (C&MA) and Supply Contract for the implementation of the West Africa Cable System (WACS) in Johannesburg, South Africa, on 8 April 2009.

WACS is a submarine fibre optic cable that will link countries in Southern Africa, Western Africa and Europe, with at least 3.84 terabits per second (Tbp/s) of international bandwidth. Planned landing points include Namibia, South Africa, Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of Congo, Cameroon, Nigeria, Togo, Ghana, Côte d´Ivoire, Cape Verde, Canary Islands, Portugal and the United Kingdom. The landings in Namibia, the DRC, the Republic of Congo and Togo will provide the first direct connections for these countries to the global submarine cable network.

Alcatel-Lucent Submarine Networks has been contracted to supply the 14,000 km long cable system with all associated landing points, which is expected to be ready for service by 2011.

Alcatel-Lucent specialises in the development, manufacture, installation, management and maintenance of state-of-the-art undersea telecommunications cable networks.

Costing about US$600-million (about N$5,420 million), the project has brought together a multitude of nations and some of the world´s most influential telecommunications players in a joint effort to use state-of-the-art technology in linking more people more efficiently than ever before.

The West Africa Cable System represents a significant telecommunications infrastructure investment through a joint effort of a number of African and Global operators and will have ample capacity to serve the region`s international connectivity needs for many years to come.

The telecommunications companies that have signed the WACS Construction and Maintenance Agreement include Telecom Namibia, Angola Telecom, Broadband Infraco, Cable & Wireless, MTN, Portugal Telecom, Sotelco, Tata Communications, Telkom SA, Togo Telecom and Vodacom.

WACS will provide Africa with faster and better connectivity to Europe and the world at far cheaper rates; savings which will be passed onto consumers.

An investment level of 2% for Telecom Namibia is envisaged in this 3.84 Tbp/s 4 fibre Cape Town to the UK system, with an own landing point at Swakopmund. Telecom Namibia´s share of that capacity would be sufficient for the country`s needs for more than 10 years, according to Wessel van der Vyver, General Manager for International Services at Telecom Namibia.

"The agreements signed make the WACS broadband sea cable a reality for us, and with it access to much cheaper, much faster fibre optic links between countries in the south and west of the continent to the rest of the world," Van der Vyver said.

For further details, please contact:

Oiva Angula

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Website: www.telecom.na

"Female engineers aren't men in skirts. Rather, they've their own set of needs, dreams, ambitions and God-given talents that they bring to their role as engineers."

These are the inspiring words of Telecom Namibia's General Manager of Service Provisioning and Assurance, Chie Wasserfall, when she delivered a motivational talk to a group of female engineering students at the Polytechnic of Namibia in Windhoek on March 12.

A former senior lecturer of engineering at the Polytechnic of Namibia and one of the notable few successful female engineers in this male-dominated industry in Namibia, Wasserfall was invited as one of the guest speakers to mark the "Women in Engineering Day" hosted by the Polytechnic's School of Engineering yesterday.

Latest figures show that of the 847 professional engineers, corporate engineers, engineering technicians and their counterparts-in-training registered with the Engineering Council of Namibia as of 31 January 2009, only 11% of them are women.

With only a very few female engineers in the country, Wasserfall cautioned the budding female engineers that pursuing a career in this field is not easy, but possible with dedication and hard work.

"Let me assure you that once you step out and complete your degree, there will be a job. It all depends entirely on you. Increasing globalisation, new markets, and changing employment patterns also mean that an engineering career is now a truly international one," Wasserfall said.

She urged the students to defy all the stereotypical prejudices, biases and cultural viewpoints that portray women as being incapable of entering this male-dominated field of engineering.

Wasserfall added that the ways in which to break this mould of being branded as "just a woman" is to use their inherent strengths and abilities by thinking "outside the box" as engineers.

"Stay being woman, don't try to be a man. The biggest mistake that a woman would do is to act what exactly stereotyping society expects us to do. However, never ever use your woman side to get want you want because in a male dominated environment, it just won't work," she said.

"In the end, it's women themselves who set boundaries on what they can achieve. As long as they dream and pursue, then they can attain anything they set out to accomplish. There are many advantages to being female engineers and scientists. Let's leverage them well."

The female engineering students were visibly spurred by Wasserfall's powerful talk and described it as inspiring and valuable.

"I believe there's no limit as to what we women engineers can do and I feel we can achieve greater things," said third-year B-Tech Electronics student Findano Shikonda.

"Out of a class of 30 engineering students we're only four girls! There are very few female students because they're afraid and think that engineering is difficult. But that isn't the case," added Peneyambeko Haifeke, a first-year engineering student.

The celebration of "Women in Engineering Day" was jointly organised by the Polytechnic of Namibia and Women in Engineering International to serve as a platform for networking, mentoring, boost self-confidence to overcome prejudice against women in engineering.

Telecom Namibia recently launched Infinitum Plus, an innovative and world-class service for enterprise customers and large organisations.

Infinitum Plus, which is designed to provide high-quality connectivity to customers for their data applications, was unveiled by Information and Communication Technology Minister Joel Kaapanda at a ceremony attended by a number of MPs, businessmen, CEOs of parastatals, senior government officials, ICT-savvy individuals and media representatives in Windhoek on 27 February 2009.

Known as also as "Carrier IP/MPLS-VPN," Infinitum Plus is a new enterprise service is based on IP Multi Protocol Label Switching, the high-speed data-carrying method for public networks. Using labels to route data packets across the Internet, MPLS has become popular worldwide, particularly for bandwidth-intensive applications, thanks to its ability to bridge legacy network technologies (i.e., ATM and frame relay) and multiple infrastructure types (Ethernet, DSL, fibre optics) with next-generation IP systems.

The launch of Infinitum Plus is a clear sign that Telecom Namibia is committed to rollout top-notch services to its customers.

"Creating new generation products and services and delivering those great communications experiences - that is our mission, our commitment, and our future," the company's board chairman Joseph Iita, said at the launch of Infinitum Plus.

In his speech, Minister Kaapanda applauded the company for its commitment to provide Namibia and its citizens with a world-class telecommunication infrastructure as well as new generation products and solutions.

He said the launch of Infinitum Plus by Telecom Namibia came after a heavy capital injection of about N$120 million for the deployment of an IP/MPLS network.

"[You] deserve a feather in the cap," the Minister said.

The Infinitum Plus solution enables Telecom Namibia to seamlessly connect customers to their headquarters, branch offices, remote users and business partners all in a secure, consistent and robust network environment.

"We're providing a solution that's optimised for high availability use in a VPN environment," said Armando Perny, Senior Manager: Product R&D at Telecom Namibia. "This is a huge opportunity for the company to offer cost-effective and robust solutions to existing customers and open up new solutions for new customers," Perny added.

The touted advantages of VPN services as opposed to build-your-own are they require less corporate manpower and training, lighten maintenance and management burdens, and support fully meshed networks without the complexity and cost of virtual circuits that are required with frame relay.

The upside is that customers can use the IP/MPLS VPN service without worrying about what access method is available. It also lets them tie into the VPN from virtually any site that has a network connection.

Infinitum Plus services are presently available in Keetmanshoop, Walvis Bay, Tsumeb, Oshakati, Luderitz, Gobabis, Otjiwarongo, Rundu, Katima Mulilo, Swakopmund and Arandis.

"With Infinitum Plus, Telecom Namibia will give users the best services at the highest value for money," said Frans Ndoroma, Managing Director of Telecom Namibia.