IslaLink and Elettra announce the construction of the IONIAN system

IONIAN will connect Crotone, Italy, with Preveza, Greece

IslaLink and Elettra, a fully owned subsidiary of Orange announced today the construction of the IONIAN submarine cable system.

The IONIAN submarine cable will connect Crotone, Italy, with Preveza, Greece. The submarine infrastructure will be complemented by two terrestrial fibre rings connecting the system to the cities of Milan and Rome in Italy and Athens and Thessaloniki in Greece.

The system will offer a high capacity, reliable, international fibre route linking Athens with Milan. This new connectivity will support the growth of ultra-broadband services in Greece and the development of Athens and Thessaloniki as regional hubs for cloud, content and telecommunication services. IONIAN will offer wholesale capacity, optical spectrum and dark fibre to telecommunication operators and content providers.

“IONIAN is a natural step in the expansion of IslaLink”, said Esther Garcés, CEO of IslaLink. “IONIAN leverages on our experience in the development of new subsea projects and in providing best-in-class services to our customers. We believe the Greek broadband market is bound for growth in the coming years, and firmly believe Athens will become a regional hub for cloud services. IslaLink wants to contribute to this growth by bringing a modern, state-of-the-art, high-capacity international system to the market that will service the needs of operators and content providers on an independent and neutral basis”.

Didier Dillard, President of Elettra added: “Bringing enhanced connectivity through the installation of new submarine cables is one of our main missions, sometimes we do it on the other side of the Earth, but sometimes we do it close to our home country. This will be the case for the IONIAN cable, and we are very pleased and proud to contribute to this project working with Islalink, with our marine survey and marine installation capabilities. ”