Sparkle and Turkcell are planning to develop a new subsea cable connecting Türkiye and Greece.
During Mobile World Congress 2025 in Barcelona last week, the companies signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for a new subsea cable in the Mediterranean Sea.
The MoU focuses on building a 4,000 km (2,485 mi) diversified route linking Türkiye (also known as Turkey) and Europe. The companies aim to place a cable between Izmir in Türkiye and Chania on the Greek island of Crete.
The planned cable will reportedly be capable of carrying more than 25Tbps per fiber pair. Few further details were available, but the project is set to be completed and operational “within a few years.”
From Chania, the system will link with Sparkle’s existing BlueMed Cable to Points of Presence in Milan.
Enrico Bagnasco, CEO of Sparkle, said: “We are very pleased with this agreement with Turkcell which confirms Sparkle’s commitment to strengthen connectivity in the Mediterranean basin. Thanks to a unique low-latency path between Izmir and Chania, integrated with BlueMed, we create a new alternative digital corridor for communications between Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. This collaboration is also part of the development of our GreenMed project which will further stimulate digital acceleration throughout the region and beyond.”
Dr. Ali Taha Koç, CEO of Turkcell, added that the planned cable offers a “promising alternative route” to existing systems, enhancing geographical redundancy. He said: “This project not only strengthens the resilience of global data infrastructure but also provides a robust option for hyperscalers and content providers seeking reliable and secure connectivity between the East and the West. In a world where the demand for seamless, high-capacity internet connectivity is ever-growing, this project plays a crucial role in reinforcing the stability of international communications."
Though it has terrestrial fiber linking Asia to Europe, Turkey has limited subsea connectivity to the rest of Europe or further afield.
The SeaMeWe-5 cable, developed in 2016 and linking Singapore to France, lands in Marmaris. Sparke is part of that cable’s investment consortium.
Sparkle’s MedNautilus, laid in 2001 and connecting the Italian island of Sicily to Greece, Cyprus, and Israel, lands in Istanbul.
Further north, Turk Telekom’s KAFOS cable, laid back in 1997, connects Istanbul to Bulgaria and Romania in the Black Sea.
Turk Telekom’s Turcyos-1 and -2, from 1993 and 2011 respectively, connect the Turkish mainland to occupied Northern Cyprus, which has been under Turkish control since 1974.
DataCenterMap suggests there are nine data centers – including one Turkcell facility – in and around Izmir.
Turkcell was founded in 1994. The state-owned Turkish Wealth Fund (TWF) acquired the company in 2020; TWF was reportedly considering a sale of the telco last year.
Sparkle operates more than 600,000km of cables that connect countries across Europe and the Americas. It operates data centers in Greece, Sicily, and Turkey, and is part of the BlueRamen cable consortium, with the Mediterranean section known as BlueMed.
The company is also an investor in the Italy-Monaco, Italy-Albania, Italy-Croatia, Italy-Malta, Trapani-Kelibia, MedNautilus, IMEWE, SeaMeWe-3, and SeaMeWe-5 cables.
Sparkle announced plans for GreenMed – a new submarine cable system connecting Italy to Croatia, Montenegro, Albania, Greece (including Crete), and Turkey/ Türkiye – in January 2024.
The company is in the process of being spun out from Telecom Italia. Italy's Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF) and Retelit, a company controlled by the Asterion fund, are set to buy Sparkle for €700 million ($728m).
