The Meta-led 2Africa subsea cable has landed in the UK at Bude, Cornwall.

At 45,000km, it is the world’s largest subsea cable and will connect 33 countries with 46 landing points across Europe, Africa, and Asia. The cable is expected to have a capacity of up to 180Tbps.

Vodafone was the landing partner for the UK portion of the cable. The telco will be responsible for managing the cable, burial on the beach, and the installation of the cable to a purpose-built manhole where 2Africa will connect to a terrestrial cable.

The terrestrial cable route will link the cable back to an existing Vodafone cable landing station. Vodafone will also provide 2Africa with onward connectivity via two terrestrial and fiber routes to London.

The 2Africa consortium consists of eight partners: Bayobab, Center3, China Mobile International, Meta, Orange, Telecom Egypt, Vodafone Group, and WIOCC. Alcatel is the manufacturer of the 16-fiber pair cable.

The cable was originally announced in 2020 and is set to circle the African continent once complete later this year.

Vodafone has been the partner for 11 landings of the 2Africa cable to date. The telco added that it named the twin fiber pairs in the cable system after Vodafone Group head of subsea partnerships, Rick Perry. The Vodafone branch of the system is referred to as SHARP (the ‘system honoring the achievements of Rick Perry’).

Perry said: “2Africa is the world’s most ambitious cable system and will help to narrow the digital divide in Africa. It’s great that the SHARP system is now online and serving customers and that it has landed in the UK.”

Cables currently landing in Bude include the Amitie, Apollo, Europe India Gateway, Grace Hopper, Yellow, and Pan-European Crossing cables. The Beaufort cable is set to land in Bude later this year.