EMC (East-Med Corridor)

July 27, 2022

ATHENS, July 26 – Greece and Saudi Arabia agreed on Tuesday on the main terms to set up a joint venture to lay a fibre optic data cable that will link Europe with Asia.

The “East to Med data Corridor”, an undersea and land data cable, will be developed by MENA HUB, owned by Saudi Arabia’s STC, Greece’s power utility Public Power Company (PPC), Cyprus’ telecoms operator CYTA and TTSA, will also hold a stake in the project.

“MENA Hub”, the international connectivity and Data Centres arm of STC Saudi Arabia, will build the cable infrastructure in partnership with Greek Telecoms and satellite applications company TTSA.

Additional details:

• Signing of the Shareholders’ Agreement between MENA HUB, CYTA, PPC, and TTSA today in Athens, in the presence of His Royal Highness Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz, Crown Prince of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and His Excellency, the Prime Minister of the Hellenic Republic, Mr. Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
• Huge increase in data connectivity from Europe through Saudi Arabia to Asia.
• A joint Venture between Saudi Arabia and Greece will lay a data cable between Greece as the European Union’s East Data Gateway and Saudi Arabia the Regional Digital Hub between Europe, Middle, Africa and Asia.
• The EMC project enables the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Greece, and Cyprus, to take advantage of their geographic position, delivering the much-needed new data corridor for the world economy, positioning the countries at the epicentre of transferring, storing, and creating data in Eurasia, by creating a digital connectivity infrastructure the countries, which is the cornerstone of the digital transformation era.
• The EMC cable has been designed from its inception to realise KSA’s Vision 2030 and Greece 2.0 by transforming the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia into a “Regional Digital Hub”, and positioning Greece and Cyprus as “European Union’s East Data Gateway”, between Europe and the Middle East, Africa, and Asia