IDC to Back Major South African Subsea Cable Project

By Duncan McLeod, TechCentral
February 25, 2025

SAEx, a long-running project by a team of South Africans to build a submarine broadband cable system, has a renewed lease on life.

TechCentral has learnt exclusively that the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) has approved project development capital to complete a “definitive” feasibility study for the SAEx East Subsea Fibre-Optic Cable Project, which will connect South Africa with Singapore in Southeast Asia.

The project, which has been in development in various guises for more than a decade, may finally be moving ahead, with financial close on fundraising expected in the second half of the year.

The last time any news emerged from the SAEx team was seven years ago, when it was said it had contracted Alcatel Submarine Networks to conduct a submarine survey.

The IDC and SAEx International Management Limited (SIML) will be co-sponsors of the SAEx East project – the first phase of an envisaged cable system that will eventually also deliver a route from South Africa to the Americas across the Atlantic Ocean. When completed, the entire cable system will be known as the SAEx Southern Oceans Network, or SAEx SON.

“The network will connect four continents along a unique but resilient southern hemispheric all-wet routing that connects South Africa to Asia via Singapore,” SAEx said in a statement shared with TechCentral.

“It will have branching units to several Indian Ocean islands and other strategic markets, including the prospect of a branch to India along the route. Through the SAEx West system, the second phase of the project, the network will connect South Africa to South America, North America and potentially West Africa.

Deep-ocean path

SAEx project director and SIML MD Rosalind Thomas said: “SAEx East is an additional undersea cable route removing dependency on the traditional Red Sea route or the proposed terrestrial routes to Europe.

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