Telecom Egypt picks Ciena for resilient optical mesh network

Diverse network paths provide high-availability, high-bandwidth connectivity acrossEgypt

HANOVER, Md. & CAIRO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 17, 2016-- Telecom Egypt (te) (Ticker: ETEL.CA; TEEG.LN) is deploying Ciena’s^® (NYSE: CIEN) GeoMesh solution and packet-optical platforms for reliable, low-latency connectivity to meet surging demands for high-bandwidth services on its national terrestrial network and submarine links between the Mediterranean and Asia. With a more agile and scalable network, Telecom Egypt’s wholesale carrier, service provider, internet content provider and consortium customers will be able to provide diverse data transit routes for international data center interconnect (DCI), disaster recovery, cloud-based services, and other high-capacity services for enterprise and consumer end-customers.

Key Facts:

• With more than 160 years of operational history, Telecom Egypt is the largest provider of fixed line services in the Middle East and Africa. Telecom Egypt offers a complete range of international telecommunications services, including voice, data, dark fiber, colocation and tailored data solutions. Its unique geographic location spans about 1,000 km on the Red Sea and 1,000 km on the Mediterranean Sea, and connects more than seventeen cable systems through seven diversified routes and five landing stations across Egypt.
• A key benefit of the Ciena-enabled mesh restoration of interconnected terrestrial and submarine networks is that Telecom Egypt can extend its offerings with a suite of extremely robust, diverse, high-availability networking services that can survive unexpected hardware and fiber route failures. Ciena’s GeoMesh also allows Telecom Egypt to proactively resolve unexpected issues and maintain network reliability.
• Ciena’s 6500 and 5430 packet-optical platforms, powered by WaveLogic Extreme coherent optics, allows Telecom Egypt to offer a diverse mix of services over high-capacity wavelengths; supporting any type of traffic, including fully transparent optical transport networks (OTN), virtual private networks (VPN), optical VPN and Ethernet services, all with stringent SLAs. The advanced performance monitoring and testing capabilities from Ciena enables fast service turn up and ability to address faults quickly and easily.

Executive quotes:

“Ciena’s technology and mesh network give us a real advantage, ensuring greater reliability and efficiencies. With Ciena enabling more granular high-bandwidth services our customers can evolve their networks and transition to a much wider suite of resilient, scalable connectivity options. Telecom Egypt is also ready to embrace upcoming technologies, like network functions virtualization (NFV).”

Tamer Gadalla, Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer ofTelecom Egypt

“Telecom Egypt truly sits at the heart of the African and Middle Eastern telecommunications markets. With Ciena’s industry-leading submarine solutions, Telecom Egypt is making the most of its unique geographical position and strategic network assets, enhancing both reliability and the end-user experience. Cost-effective, scalable and competitive connectivity also enables Telecom Egypt to launch new, next-generation data services across this critical route.”

Gary Smith, President & Chief Executive Officer ofCiena

About Telecom Egypt

Telecom Egypt (te) , Egypt’s incumbent telecommunications operator, started its operations in 1854 with the first telegraph line in Egypt. Then it was corporatized in 1998 to replace the former Arab Republic of Egypt National Telecommunication Organization (ARENTO). The Company is the largest provider of fixed-line services in the Middle East and Africa with 6.3 million subscribers as at 30 June 2016.

te provides retail telecommunication services including access, local, long distance and international voice, Internet and data, and other services. The company also provides wholesale services including bandwidth capacity leasing to ISPs, and national and international interconnection services. te’s services also include the provision of narrowband and broadband internet access through its subsidiary TE Data. TE Data has active operations in Egypt and Jordan.

te currently participates in the mobile segment in Egypt by providing mobile interconnectivity through its current, increased 44.95% holding in Vodafone Egypt, one of the three existing Egyptian mobile operator.

te’s shares and GDRs (Ticker: ETEL.CA; TEEG.LN) are traded on The Egyptian Exchange and the London Stock Exchange.