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e& To Establish Largest Subsea Cable Connection In UAE
The cable will land at the carrier’s neutral SmartHub Data Centre to enhance connectivity across the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and Africa.
e& Carrier & Wholesale is preparing to lay the most extensive subsea cable network in UAE, dubbed “2Afria”. The chosen gateway for this significant communications upgrade is Kalba, a tranquil city in the northeastern United Arab Emirates. This strategic choice augments e&’s existing Fujairah cable landing station, diversifying connectivity in the UAE and hopefully boosting network resilience.
The 2Africa consortium of Bayobab, including centre3, China Mobile International, Meta, Orange, Telecom Egypt, Vodafone Group, and WIOCC, is behind the massive 45,000 km submarine cable system, which is currently the largest of its kind worldwide.
Alcatel Submarine Networks is responsible for building and installing the 2Africa cable, which will deliver essential internet capacity and reliability upgrades across substantial swathes of Africa while also addressing growing network demand across the Middle East.
As the UAE designated landing partner for 2Africa, e& will be in charge of the development and construction of the necessary infrastructure for the landing station as well as maintenance over the coming decades.
Nabil Baccouche, e& Group Chief Carrier & Wholesale Officer, explained: “The 2Africa project promises to elevate the overall digital landscape in the region, solidifying the country’s position as one of the region’s premier ICT hubs. e &’s involvement in this transformative project will significantly enhance the Internet user experience in the UAE, enabling the world’s largest content providers and global carriers to deliver cutting edge technology in e& carrier-neutral data center ecosystem, SmartHub”.
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Around 20 subsea cable systems come ashore in the UAE, most of which are already managed by e&. The carrier is, therefore, ideally suited to carry out work on the new cable system, as it already boasts unique technical expertise and a robust existing network.
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Trip.com Is Betting An AI Agent Will Book Your Next Vacation
Abu Dhabi, Jazeera Airways and a run of hotel deals give the company more inventory. Its Mastercard demo says the most about where booking technology is headed.
Most of what Trip.com Group announced at Arabian Travel Market 2026 this week reads like the standard expansion playbook of an online travel agency: a new agreement with a tourism board, a run of hotel partnerships, an airline deal. However, one item was considerably more interesting: a demonstration built with Mastercard of an AI agent that doesn’t just suggest trips but also pays for them.
The showcase put TripGenie, the company’s AI travel assistant, to work searching, selecting and completing purchases inside a single booking flow, with Mastercard’s Agent Suite for Merchants handling the payment step and Network International processing the transactions on the merchant side. It’s limited for now to attractions and ancillary services, but the partners plan a phased commercial rollout from early 2027.
“As traveller expectations change, technology and AI will play an increasingly important role in how people plan their journeys,” says Schubert Lou, CEO of Trip.com.
Meanwhile, in more conventional news, CEO Lou and Saleh Mohamed Al Geziry (Director General for Tourism at the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi), signed an agreement building on the two organizations’ existing partnership, with joint marketing and Abu Dhabi destination content to be pushed across Trip.com Group’s platforms.
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On accommodation, the group expanded its partnerships with JA Hotels & Resorts, Ishraq Hospitality and Aleph Hospitality and deepened its work with Silkhaus, which brings vacation homes into a portfolio that has so far leaned on hotels. Jazeera Airways signed a strategic partnership intended to widen the Kuwaiti carrier’s reach and encourage earlier bookings, tied to Kuwait’s own tourism ambitions.
The company moved into a larger Dubai office earlier this year and describes its long-term aim as a two-way ecosystem: sending Middle East travelers abroad while drawing international visitors in.
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