Namibia scores higher in infrastructure-driven Africa ICT metrics

**Staff Writer **

Namibia is making great strides in terms of telecommunications infrastructure investment, according to Paratus Namibia.

The company says while the country may lag behind some of its Southern African Development Community peers such as South Africa and Mauritius, Namibia scores significantly higher than the African average in infrastructure-driven metrics with the International Telecommunication Union’s (ITU) ICT Development Index placing Namibia above larger economies like Kenya, Ghana and Nigeria.

Paratus Namibia recently installed another 600 kilometers of fiber, bringing its total fiber network to over 5 000 kilometers.

One of the company’s most significant infrastructure projects has been the rollout of the Paratus mobile network, representing an investment of N$600 million over the past 24 months.

Managing director of Paratus Namibia, Andrew Hall, says: “The 595 kilometers of fiber we added in the past year is a good indication of the scale at which we are building. That said, a strong and resilient network is about much more than fiber alone. It means having different technologies, alternative routes and sufficient capacity so that customers are not dependent on a single point of connection.”

This resilience extends beyond Namibia. Paratus has access to both the Equiano and WACS submarine cable systems on Africa’s west coast and is the landing partner for Equiano in Namibia.

Its own Trans-Kalahari fiber route connects Windhoek to Johannesburg, providing another route out of the country and onward access to east coast submarine cable systems, including SEACOM.

Within Namibia, redundancy is built into the network wherever possible.

Paratus uses two backhaul providers to connect its points of presence, predominantly using its own infrastructure as the primary route and an independent provider as the secondary route.

Hall says this level of network diversity is increasingly important as businesses, households and services become more dependent on reliable connectivity.

“Businesses cannot afford to lose access to the systems and applications they depend on every day. The same is increasingly true for households and communities. Our job is to ensure the infrastructure behind any connection is strong enough, diverse enough and has the capacity to keep pace with demand.”

The next phase of the Paratus Namibia infrastructure programme includes further expansion of the national mobile network, a significant capacity upgrade to its point-to-multipoint fixed wireless network, continued fiber expansion and the Data Hall 2 expansion project.

Paratus plans to invest millions of Namibian Dollars over the next few years to continue expanding its footprint, increasing capacity and building greater resilience across the network.