LION (Lower Indian Ocean NetWork) is a 1000km submarine cable connecting Madagascar, Réunion and Mauritius, ready for service in March, 2010.

The LION cable system consists of two fiber pairs, with an initial design capacity of 1.28Tbps (2*64*10Gbps).

The LION consortium comprises Orange Madagascar, Mauritius Telecom and France Telecom S.A.. Overall, the LION project cost an estimated US$37 million. 

LION2 (Lower Indian Ocean NetWork II) is a 2700km submarine cable network connecting LION to Mayotte and Mombasa, Kenya. The LION2 is an extension of the LION cable system.

The LION2 consortium includes France Telecom-Orange and its subsidiaries Mauritius Telecom, Orange Madagascar and Telkom Kenya, Emtel, Societe Reunionnaise du Radiotelephone and STOI Internet.

Telkom Kenya operates a cable landing station in Nyali, Mombasa for the LION2 cable system.

The LION2 cable system costs about $76 million with $42 million coming directly from France Telecom.

The LION2 cable system was ready for service in April 2012, with an initial design capacity of 1.28Tbps  (2*64*10Gbps).