Addis Ababa, September 10, 2026 (FMC) — Ethiopia, Djibouti and Sudan are advancing a strategic cross-border fiber corridor toward commercialization, bringing a major regional connectivity initiative closer to providing global carriers and hyperscalers with an alternative route for data traffic across the Red Sea.
Ethio telecom, Djibouti Telecom and Sudatel Group brought together leading international technology and connectivity companies in Addis Ababa for a high-level stakeholders’ workshop focused on the pre-commercialization phase of the Horizon Cross-Border Terrestrial Fiber Initiative.
The corridor is designed to link cable landing stations in Djibouti and Port Sudan through Ethiopia, creating a high-capacity, low-latency terrestrial route with protected and redundant network architecture. The initiative was formalized through a tripartite agreement among the three telecom operators in February 2026.
The latest workshop focused on the commercial and technical requirements for advancing the corridor, with network architecture expertise provided by Ciena, Nokia and BringCom.
The discussions brought together major global technology, cloud and connectivity players, including Google, Meta through HIPConsult, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Airtel Africa, Bayobab, WIOCC, Nokia, Ciena, center3, Saudi Vision and China Mobile International.
Participating global operators and technology partners expressed strong interest in leveraging the corridor’s planned multi-terabit capacity, according to Ethio telecom.
Jointly developed by the three telecom operators, Horizon is intended to provide data transport, colocation and hosting services, with landing access in Djibouti and Sudan. Its resilient, high-speed architecture is designed to serve increasingly data-intensive applications, including cloud computing, artificial intelligence, fintech, e-commerce and digital content delivery.
For Ethiopia, the corridor also strengthens the country’s role as a strategic terrestrial link between major international connectivity routes, while offering regional partners an additional pathway for moving growing volumes of digital traffic.
The initiative underscores the potential of cross-border African infrastructure partnerships to combine national networks and geographic advantages in building more resilient connections to the global digital economy.