Connectivity in Central Africa will receive a major boost as Orange will be the first global telecom operator to blend satellite-based revolutionary terabit-scale O3b mPOWER communications system into its network. The move is to support the growing demand for connectivity in Africa, starting from the Central Africa Republic, a press statement by the SES says.

The document released last week, reports that Orange is on track to adopt the SES’s Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellite communications system, to expedite its consumer and business services.

 Orange has had partnership deals with SES since 2017 and has been a user of SES’s current generation O3b MEO managed services since then, with an extensive market in Africa and the Middle East.

With O3b mPOWER, Orange hopes to increase its low-latency MEO-enabled capacities to extend its bandwidth requirements, bought about by the continuous growth of its customer base. The system will enable Orange to offer high broadband and seamless connectivity, as well as its expand its business territories.

Also, Orange Central African Republic will leverage the world’s only multi-orbit network, utilising SES’s MEO and GEO (Geostationary Earth Orbit) satellites to connect and aggregate 2G/3G traffic from remote base stations around the country to the core network in the capital of Bangui, the document further states. The move gives the operator a unique source for cellular backhaul and core IP transit, as well as a steady and seamless experience between the MEO and GEO services.

“We are thrilled to be partners and early adopters of this innovation with SES, and to be able to offer high-quality connectivity in the most remote locations of the Central African Republic. This longstanding partnership fully aligns with our mission of building smarter and open networks to bridge the digital divide in Africa, and to increase the speed and geographic reach of our network,” Jean-Luc Vuillemin, Executive Vice President of Orange International Networks Infrastructures and Services says, as quoted in the release.

Elaborating further, JP Hemingway, the CEO of SES Networks said the current deal signals a critical milestone for both companies and also for the broader industry. 

“With the innovative O3b mPOWER system, Orange and SES are revolutionising the telco market, and the way networks can be extended and improved. With its ability to power a wide range of telecommunications needs, including cellular backhaul and high-performance cloud connectivity, O3b mPOWER – together with other terrestrial infrastructure – is key to connecting remote and underserved regions in the most economically viable way”, he concluded.

About O3b mPower

O3b mPOWER, is the world’s only fully-funded non-geostationary orbit (NGSO) broadband system in development today. The system is located only 8,000 kilometres away from Earth, and power low-latency high-throughput solutions that can be blended into existing terrestrial networks. When operational in 2022, O3b mPOWER will provide multiple terabits of throughput globally to drive digital transformation and cloud adoption virtually anywhere on the planet.

The highly flexible O3b mPOWER constellation comprises ultra-high-capacity, low-latency, high-power MEO satellites, each with up to 5,000 fully-shapeable and steerable beams that can be shifted and scaled in real-time to meet customers’ demands. The system is ideally suited for domestic cellular backhaul and simultaneous international IP trunking applications.

Orange is one of the world’s leading multi-service telecommunications operators and is present in 18 countries in Africa.