Marrakech – Nokia has secured the contract to supply technology for the ambitious Medusa submarine cable project, the Finnish telecommunications group announced Monday.
The company will provide its 1830 GX platform and ICE7 coherent optics, enabling transmission of tens of terabits per second per fiber pair with low latency and high energy efficiency.
The 8,700-kilometer digital interconnection will link the Atlantic coast, Mediterranean Sea, and Red Sea, creating a new high-speed digital corridor in the region. The cable system promises a total capacity of 480 terabits per second, with 20 Tbit/s for each of its 24 fiber pairs.
With a total investment of €342 million, partly funded by the European Union, the Medusa project will connect Cyprus, Greece, France, Portugal, Italy, and Spain to Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt.
This strategic digital bridge aims to close the connectivity gap between Europe and North Africa, bringing faster and more reliable service to millions while facilitating access to advanced technologies like 5G and AI across the Mediterranean region.
Designed as an open-access system, Medusa offers regional telecom operators access to advanced connectivity services, supporting 5G deployment, cloud infrastructure growth, and increasing bandwidth needs for AI and future technologies.
The infrastructure will connect Morocco to Southern Europe by linking Nador to Marseille. Additionally, the cable will reach Morocco through Tetouan.
In January 2024, Moroccan operator Inwi signed a strategic partnership agreement with Medusa Submarine Cable System to strengthen its trans-Mediterranean connectivity. This partnership focuses on providing and operating dedicated fiber optic links in the new submarine cable.
A year earlier, Orange Morocco also concluded an agreement with Medusa to offer a secure, open, and high-performance interconnection solution between Europe and Morocco. To achieve this, the operator decided to invest in new submarine cable hosting infrastructure in the Nador region.
Boosting connectivity and cutting broadband costs ahead
Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN), a Nokia subsidiary, was designated in 2022 as the technical partner for the construction of the Medusa submarine cable.
Beyond providing the high-speed telecommunications infrastructure, the agreement between AFR-IX Telecom and ASN also stipulates that the latter will handle the physical installation of the cable.
The project launched in 2022 with support from Orange and the European Investment Bank (EIB). The supply contract took effect in 2023, paving the way for several major technical milestones.
In 2024, teams began route preparation work, conducted technical and environmental feasibility studies, finalized cable routing engineering, and completed seabed inspection before validating equipment in the factory through successful acceptance tests. The sea deployment phase began in 2025.
Studies by the Foundation for Studies and Research on International Development (FERDI) and the World Bank show that doubling submarine cable capacity typically leads to a 30-50% decrease in mobile broadband rates while promoting better service adoption.
The arrival of a new cable like Medusa should also strengthen network redundancy on the continent, where submarine cable failures remain frequent and cause major internet connectivity disruptions.
The next stage in Morocco will involve constructing the necessary infrastructure to accommodate the connection with the cable in Arekmane, in Nador province. Medusa is expected to enter service starting in 2026.
