Sometime last year we wrote about the $150 million that Liquid Telecom was trying to source for the expansion of its fibre network throughout Africa.
Now, according to its website the telecoms infrastructure company has now secured the funds through a loan facilitated by Standard Chartered Bank and provided for by large global investment banks.
Liquid Telecom currently has a fibre network that now spans over 18,000 km and passes through 15 countries. The funds are meant to expand that reach to other parts of the continent, something that ties in with the company founder’s Fibre from Cape to Cairo vision.
For Zimbabwe, Zambia, Rwanda and Kenya part of this new fund will be ploughed into the existing Fibre to The Home (FTTH) rollout programme. This is what we have come to notice in parts of the country, specifically in Harare through fibre trenches, as well as some overhead fibre.
The availability of fibre services is being executed through ZOL Zimbabwe, the Liquid owned Internet Service Provider. ZOL introduced ZOL FIbroniks which is the home and office suite of fibre services that are available from $39 per month and can offer services of up to 100Mbps.
All this is meant to result in the realisation of other broadband opportunities that revolve around fast and stable internet such as entertainment and communication services like VoIP that ZOL has already started rolling out.
