Liquid uses Taara’s wireless optics to link enterprises to data centres in Lagos

Details: John Tanner; Category: Wireless Networks; 06 August 2026; 1869 views

Free space optics vendor Taara announced on Wednesday that Liquid Intelligent Technologies is using its technology to connect large enterprise customers to data centres in Lagos, Nigeria.

Taara said that it’s been helping Liquid distribute nearly a dozen wireless optical links over the past two years from its PoPs at Africa Data Centres (a subsidiary of Cassava Technologies, which also owns Liquid) and other data centres in Lagos to large enterprises around and outside the city, including local ISPs, banks, hotels and a utility company.

Taara – a spinoff from Google X, Alphabet’s moonshot factory – said its free space optics technology delivers up to 20 Gbps of capacity across distances of up to 20 km. This enables operators to establish links in days rather than weeks, which Taara said is a key advantage in dense urban environments like Lagos where expanding network can be challenging.

Bhavesh Mistry, regional lead for Taara in Africa, said that while the technology obviously benefits enterprises located where fibre doesn’t yet reach, it also complements fibre networks in areas prone to outages caused by cable cuts, which can take days to restore.

“As demand for connectivity continues to grow, operators need more flexibility in how they expand and reinforce their networks,” he said. “Wireless optical communication gives operators another tool to extend capacity, reach customers faster, and build more resilient networks without compromising performance.”

“For Liquid, deployment speed has been one of the most significant advantages,” added Eugene Uka, acting CEO of Liquid Intelligent Technologies Nigeria. “Taara links can often be installed and activated within hours.”

Liquid said it’s currently exploring opportunities to expand deployment of Taara’s solution in other cities in Nigeria, including Abuja, Ibadan and Kano.

Liquid has been partnering with Taara since 2020. In 2021, it deployed Taara’s technology to provide a wireless optical link between Kinshasa and Congo Brazzaville in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).