Vodafone is to deploy a new subsea cable in the Mediterranean Sea.

Announced this week, Vodafone’s Carrier Services unit will construct a new cable system in Greece, linking Crete with the Greek mainland.

Called the Thetis Express, the 180Tbps system will comprise two segments of 129 and 163 kilometers, plus terrestrial connections across the island of Milos and end points on Crete and in Athens.

Work has started on the new cable, with the marine survey underway.

Fanan Henriques, product and international business director, Vodafone Business, said: “Vodafone plays a central role in ensuring Internet traffic flows smoothly and securely worldwide. We are now extending this capability to more places in Greece using a mix of new optical fibre terrestrial and subsea cables, and in the future, emerging satellite services like space-based direct-to-device mobile broadband.”

The company aims to link the Thetis Express to the Meta-led 2Africa cable network, which lands at Vodafone’s cable landing station in Crete.

Vodafone has capacity on over 70 subsea cable systems across 100 countries.

Crete is the landing point for a dozen live and planned subsea cables across six landing points. Several, including the EMC West-1, Minoas East and West, Medusa, and the Apollo East and West systems, connect to the Greek mainland.