Egypt and China have strengthened their ties in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector through the signing of five major memoranda of understanding (MoUs).
The agreements, worth around $1.1 million, were signed during the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation and aim to establish 3 factories for manufacturing fiber optic cables and communication equipment, and 3 centers that provide outsourced services for export and that create 800 jobs in relevant industries.
Wuhan FiberHome International Technologies, a leading provider of IT and communication infrastructure and integrated services, will establish a factory in Egypt to produce fiber optic cables, communication terminal devices, and base station antennas. The facility will have an annual output of 1 million core kilometers of fiber, 500,000 communication terminal devices, and 3,000 base station antennas.
Hengtong Group will build a second factory in the Suez Canal EconomicZone (SCZone) worth $15 million to produce fiber optic cables and FTTX network accessories. The factory will have an annual output of 3 million kilometers of fiber optic cables, with 40% of the output to be exported to Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.
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The Huawei Egypt Development Center will be launched by Huawei Egypt, with a focus on developing a cloud computing ecosystem, training developers, and providing local industry solutions. By 2025, the facility hopes to have trained 1,500 developers and certified 500 more.
ZTE plans to produce local telecommunications products, including fixed network terminals and optical network distribution products. The company will also collaborate with Egypt’s Information Technology Industry Development Agency (ITIDA) to establish training centers for 1,200 participants over three years.
Lastly, State-owned Tsinghua Unigroup, will create a technology investment fund with an initial capital of $300 million, with contributions of between 60-70% from the company and its affiliates. The agreement includes setting up a data center, developing cloud services, and researching electronic chip design and AI applications to develop large language models (LLMs) in Arabic.
