Vodafone and Avaroa Cable Ltd Work Together To Get Ready For Manatua Cable

Phil Henderson of Vodafone Cook Islands and Ranulf Scarbrough of Avaroa Cable Ltd at the Vodafone Cook Islands office, Rarotonga, May 2020
Phil Henderson of Vodafone Cook Islands and Ranulf Scarbrough of Avaroa Cable Ltd at the Vodafone Cook Islands office, Rarotonga, May 2020

RAROTONGA, COOK ISLANDS, 06 MAY 2020

Avaroa Cable Ltd and Vodafone Cook Islands have confirmed today that they are working together to get ready for the Manatua Cable going live later this year.

Avaroa Cable Ltd separately confirmed that the Manatua One Polynesia cable construction was on track and within budget. Most of the cable is nearing the end of the commissioning and testing phase with long term stability testing, one of the final checks, already underway.

Vodafone confirmed that they have now connected to both of ACL’s cable landing stations in Rarotonga and Aitutaki with optical fibre linking the cable stations to Vodafone’s own network facilities in readiness for go-live.

Engineers from Vodafone and ACL are working together to test the network interconnections and cable interfaces.

Vodafone Cook Islands Chief Executive Officer Phil Henderson said: “The Manatua Cable is an important development for the future connectivity of the Cook Islands. Vodafone recognises this and is working actively to ensure the benefits will be passed to our customers. Despite the COVID-19 distractions and challenges, its great to see the Avaroa and Vodafone teams working together to make this happen.”

Dr Ranulf Scarbrough, ACL CEO and Vice Chair of the Manatua Cable Consortium said: “Avaroa Cable has been very fortunate to have laid the Manatua Cable before COVID-19 forced most of the world into isolation. We still have some work to do before the cable goes live but things are going well.In parallel, we are finalising the commercial arrangements for use of the cable and Vodafone are working closely with us on this. Its been a long journey but we are nearly there with this important upgrade to the connectivity of the Cook Islands.”

Further information

Enquiries about this news release should be made to Rebecca Tavioni on +682-56621 or rebecca.tavioni@cookislands.gov.ck and to Lahaina Kiely on +682-54680 or lkiely@vodafone.co.ck

About Vodafone Cook Islands

Vodafone Cook Islands is a telecommunications services provider offering mobile, fixed line, broadband and a range of other telecommunications technology-based services. Controlling ownership of the business is held by Amalgamated Telecom Holdings Limited, a publicly listed company on the Fiji stock exchange. The business is 55% locally owned.

About Avaroa Cable Ltd

ACL is the Pacific’s newest international fibre operator providing wholesale connectivity services in the Cook Islands. ACL is a state-owned enterprise (SOE) and manages the Cooks Islands involvement in the Manatua Cable project and its commercialisation as an international and domestic wholesale operator. ACL has been established, and the independent board which oversees it is appointed by, the Cook Islands Investment Corporation, which is the government body responsible for SOEs. ACL’s board is chaired by local business woman Tatiana Burn. Funding has been provided by the Cook Islands Government, the New Zealand Aid Programme and the Asian Development Bank. (www.avaroacable.com)

About the Manatua – One Polynesia Cable

The Manatua cable will be 3600km long connecting Samoa, Niue, Rarotonga, Aitutaki, Tahiti and Bora. The cable will be capable of operating at up to 10 tera bits per second (= 10,000,000 megabits per second) using state-of-the-art fibre optic technology, enough speed to download 300 high definition movies every single second.

About the Manatua Cable Consortium

The ground-breaking Manatua cable consortium was formed following the signing of an International Treaty in November 2018 between the governments of the Cook Islands, Niue, Samoa and French Polynesia. The purpose of the consortium is to build and operate the Manatua cable. The consortium comprises Avaroa Cable Ltd (for the Cooks Islands), Niue Telecom, the Samoa Submarine Cable Company and Office de Poste et Telecommunications (for French Polynesia). It is the first consortium of its type anywhere in the Pacific.

About the New Zealand Aid Programme

The Cook Islands involvement in the Manatua Cable project has been part funded with NZ$15m of grant funding from the New Zealand Aid Programme. (www.mfat.govt.nz/en/aid-and-development)

About the Asian Development Bank

The Cooks Islands involvement in the Manatua Cable project has been part funded with US$15m of loan funding from the Asian Development Bank.

(www.adb.org)



More press releases