Connecting Africa: Why Africa’s Terrestrial Fiber is the Only Path to Digital Inclusion

Connectivity is no longer a “nice-to-have” luxury. It has become the backbone of Africa’s economic and social transformation, the foundation on which future industries, services, and opportunities will be built. Across the continent, the demand for digital services is growing at a pace unmatched in history. Africa is home to more than 500 million internet users: a number that continues to rise as young, mobile-first populations seek access to education, healthcare, financial inclusion, and entertainment. This surge in digital consumption places immense pressure on our networks.

Still, Africa’s connectivity map remains uneven. Submarine cables now link coastal cities to the world, yet vast inland and landlocked regions remain underserved. At the heart of this challenge lies terrestrial fiber. Mobile networks and satellite solutions have expanded reach, but only fiber can deliver the resiliency, capacity, and affordability needed for true digital inclusion. Without decisive investment to carry this connectivity inland, we risk entrenching a new kind of inequality: a digital divide that could lock Africa out of the very future it seeks to build. But with bold action, the continent has the chance not just to catch up, but to leapfrog into the global digital economy.

At this year’s International Telecoms Week, held in Nairobi, industry leaders came together to explore partnerships, investment, and innovation across the global connectivity ecosystem. I had the privilege of joining peers at the Terrestrial Fiber Workshop, where we tackled one of Africa’s most pressing challenges and greatest opportunities: expanding connectivity through innovation and collaboration. The discussions reaffirmed a conviction that we hold deeply at CSquared: connectivity is the foundation of Africa’s future competitiveness.

Laying fiber alone will not unlock Africa’s digital potential. Fiber must be designed around real demand, the businesses, schools, hospitals, and innovation hubs that turn connectivity into tangible value. At CSquared, we have seen firsthand that connectivity grows strongest where demand is concentrated. Each kilometer is an investment in the students who will learn, the entrepreneurs who will trade, the creators who will innovate, and the communities who will connect through it.

This also means business models must evolve. Time and again, infrastructure projects have faltered because they ignored long-term financial viability. Fiber cannot be affordable if it is not sustainable, and it cannot be sustainable if it does not meet community needs. Aligning investment with demand ensures that connectivity remains not only impactful but also commercially resilient.

As agreed during the panel discussions at ITW, Africa’s connectivity challenge is too big for any one player to solve alone. Real progress will only come when governments, power providers, and private investors work together: governments to create fair regulations and open rights of way, power providers to guarantee stable energy, and investors to commit capital with a long-term view of Africa’s growth.

At CSquared, we have seen the power of this collaborative model. It is embedded in our DNA and reinforced by the global partners who share our vision. In Togo for instance, our subsidiary CSquared Woezon serves as the landing partner for Google’s Equiano subsea cable. These collaborations are the backbone of a new digital ecosystem where shared risk creates shared opportunity for markets long underserved.

Of course, the barriers are real. High deployment costs, regulatory fragmentation, and unreliable power remain persistent challenges. But these should not be excuses for inaction. Rather, they should be treated as the very problems innovation and collaboration are designed to solve. The fiber industry must find creative financing models, push for harmonized cross-border regulation, and embrace energy-efficient deployments that reduce dependency on fragile grids.

This was a recurring observation during our discussions: while alternative solutions such as satellite services can extend reach, they cannot replace the backbone role of terrestrial fiber. Satellites may complement the landscape, but without fiber to anchor them, capacity and affordability will always be constrained. It is terrestrial fiber that ensures Africa’s digital economy has the resiliency and scalability it needs.

Today, CSquared operates more than 7,500 kilometers of open-access fiber across six countries, enabling over 100 ISPs and mobile operators to scale services affordably. Our open-access model ensures infrastructure is shared rather than duplicated, driving down costs while expanding reach. By combining subsea capacity with terrestrial networks, as we have done in West Africa, we are building the resilience Africa needs, so that a single outage never cripples millions of connections.

But we are not stopping there. Our focus now is on stitching Africa’s networks together by building cross-border terrestrial corridors and edge data centers that transform today’s fragmented systems into true digital superhighways. We design with resilience in mind, blending local sourcing with global expertise. Each kilometer of fiber brings us closer to a future where schools, hospitals, startups, and entire communities are not just connected, but empowered.

Africa cannot wait for perfect conditions. The continent’s youth, its surging demand, and its hunger for digital opportunity demand action now. As I reiterated to delegates, the future of Africa’s digital economy will be built together through fiber that connects networks, people, communities, and opportunities.

The prize for getting this right is clear: positioning Africa as a hub for global digital innovation. The cost of delay is equally stark: millions excluded from opportunities others take for granted. From our discussions at ITW, one clarity emerged: Africa’s digital future is both imaginable and attainable. The task now is to turn that shared vision into coordinated execution, because the cost of inaction will be counted in opportunities lost for an entire generation.

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