The history of submarine cables has been marked for more than 170 years by a succession of events and twists and turns.

In the middle of the 19th century, the first international submarine connection appeared, linking France to Great Britain. It was towards the end of the 19th century that the expansion of submarine cables took off and made it possible to connect the most remote regions of the planet via telegraphy. However, with the advent of optical fiber and its increased development in the mid-1980s, we are witnessing the unchallenged reign of submarine cables over international communications. 

Since then, submarine fiber optic cables have had the advantage over all other communication media and are the ultimate global highways of connectivity. About 99% of international communications today transit via submarine cables, and according to the Telegeography research center, there are about 430 submarine cables in service worldwide that are buried on the ocean floor, including more than ten on the African coasts. The characteristics that naturally make submarine cables successful are essentially the transmission capacity and the reliability of the repeaters. 

Today, the submarine cable market is mainly dominated by telecom operators who need these infrastructures to cope with the increasingly pressing bandwidth demand of customers. As these infrastructures cost a fortune, they often find themselves as co-owners within a consortium to finance these submarine cables and then share the capacity. 

The example of the Main One, ACE, WACS consortia… is a perfect illustration of this. 

Our country, with a network of more than 10.000 km of fiber optic cables throughout the national territory with the networks of Sonatel, SENEGAL NUMERIQUE SA, TIGO, EXPRESSO, is placed on the podium of countries with high-quality fiber optic infrastructure.

At least 4 submarine cables land on our marine coasts, namely: GLO 1, ACE, SAT3, ATLANTIS 2, MAIN ONE, SHARE (the submarine cable deployed by SENUM SA over 720 km between Dakar and Praia) and soon there would be the arrival of 2Africa which will only strengthen the technological achievements.

Having these submarine fiber optic cables is already an eminently strategic asset and will allow citizens and telecom operators to have an essential tool for the proper provision of information, and will also allow a significant improvement in telecommunications services in the country, in particular the Internet, voice and data transport. 

So many major advances that will contribute to the development of innovative platforms such as remote administrative procedures, cloud computing, e-commerce, e-health, e-learning, etc. 

And all this contributes indirectly to the emergence of the country's society and economy.

However, the state, operators and citizens will benefit greatly from this technology by improving security, also expanding the range of services offered, and above all by renting capacity to Internet access providers and other telecom operators.

The possibility of establishing partnerships with continental countries such as Mali, Burkina Faso or Niger could also open up great opportunities allowing these countries to benefit from the optical fibre of submarine cables and our operators who co-own submarine cables to derive maximum financial and strategic profits. That said, the stakes of submarine cables are significant and the advantages they offer in terms of connectivity are immense. 

In summary, understanding innovation in submarine cables also means understanding the role of the players who act on the network because submarine cables are today the pillars of global communications.