Google’s new cable to boost Africa’s internet resilience

Google has announced Umoja, a new fiber optic cable connecting Africa to Australia.

The tech giant disclosed this on Thursday. The cable will be anchored in Kenya and will pass through Uganda, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, and the Google Cloud region, before crossing the Indian Ocean to Australia.

Umoja, the Swahili word for unity, has its terrestrial path built with Liquid Technologies to form a highly scalable route through Africa, including access points that will allow other countries to take advantage of the network, Google said.

The tech giant noted that establishing a new route distinct from existing connectivity routes is critical to maintaining a resilient network for a region that has historically experienced high-impact outages.

“Access to the latest technology, supported by reliable and resilient digital infrastructure, is critical to growing economic opportunity. This is a meaningful moment for Kenya’s digital transformation journey and the benefits of today’s announcement will cascade across the region,” said, Meg Whitman, U.S. Ambassador to Kenya.

“Africa’s major cities including Nairobi, Kampala, Kigali, Lubumbashi, Lusaka, and Harare will no longer be hard-to-reach endpoints remote from the coastal landing sites that connect Africa to the world. They are now stations on a data superhighway that can carry thousands of times more traffic than currently reaches here,” added Strive Masiyiwa, chairman and founder of Liquid.

Google further stated that it has signed a collaboration with Kenya’s Ministry of Information Communications to accelerate joint efforts in cybersecurity, grow data-driven innovation, and digital upskilling,

As part of the collaboration, Google Cloud and Kenya will partner to enhance Kenya’s cyber threat capabilities, protect web-facing infrastructure, and help teams develop skills and processes that drive effective security operations.