London — WIOCC's Open Access Data Centers has said it will invest US$500 million in data centres across Sub-Saharan Africa in the next five years. Russell Southwood spoke this week to Open Access Data Centres' CEO Ayotunde Coker about its Edge computing strategy and its expansion plans.
Ayotunder Coker was the pioneering CEO of Rack Centre in Lagos and left to become CEO of Open Access Data Centres because "it's part of the WIOCC Group which I've known for years for its connectivity contribution. It has a broad strategy for the continent, which is right. In terms of data centres, it wants to be able to offer large hyperscalers a place and go through to the mid-scale and then right the way through to the local. Edge computing suits Africa in how it will grow and scale."
Open Access Data Centres has a facility in Durban that will connect to the 2Africa cable and grow to 5MW and another facility at Isando, which will also grow to 5MW. In addition, it has two facilities in Cape Town coming on stream: Rondebosch which is connected to the Equiano cable and Brakenfell which will be ready in 6 weeks time. There are also plans for a facility in Johannesburg.
In Nigeria, it will soon go live with 1 MW of capacity and it will be linked to the Equiano cable at the end of this month. The facility is being built on a 4 hectare site and will go up to 15-20 MW over time: "We have other locations we're looking at across the continent and we'll be making announcements in the next two months."
These include plans for a facility in DRC in partnership with a local company due to go live in Q1, 2023: "We're also looking at possibilities in Zambia. We're making good progress on attracting customers in South Africa and we're being seen as a credible brand. We're carrier neutral and can provide levels of mass interconnect and internet exchange."
'it's about being able to connect data centres to carriers of carriers and the ecosystem of other carriers. In South Africa, we have Rain, Equiano and 2Africa. We have 30 Edge data centres, typically with 10-15 rack capacity."
So how will Edge computing work in the regulatory context of increasing amounts of national data sovereignty regulation?: "Getting data to the Edge is a practical thing. Existing technology and latency make it a very practical thing."
Coker thinks the continent's Governments need to be thinking about data sovereignty at a continental level: "Working at this level is more efficient. Our own platform can bring this about and say working at the level of economic blocs like ECOWAS gives you scale. Who's going to invest in a location where you can't serve elsewhere? For example, Zambia and neighboring DRC will grow together. If you don't have these kind of cross-country links, you're out of it and no-one will come to your country."
There's been an enormous wave of data centre investment in Sub-Saharan Africa this year but Coker does not think it will lead to over-supply: "I think we'll see 8-40 MW of capacity in Lagos and 15 MW of that will be ours. The investirs coming to the continent are credible companies with credible leadership."
From where he sits, does he see the mobile operators as still staying in the data centre space?: "I think they're out. We have good relationships with their leaderships all over Africa. We'll have partnerships over time. Why as a carrier have a data centre? It's difficult not being neutral and without an ecosystem."
"It costs let's US$100 million to build 10 MW of capacity. If you do that, you're taking it out of the core business and away from network investment and the pivot into data and 5G. You need to optimize your CAPEX. There's been a shift in the centre of gravity and you need to go to the place where you can meet all the players."
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In Brief
Cote d'Ivoire: NuRAN Wireless Inchas announced an agreement for up to 1,000 sites with MTN Ivory Coast for the deployment of rural sites under the Network-as-a-Service ("NaaS") business model in Ivory Coast. The 5-year agreement with MTN Ivory Coast is expected to be the Company's second largest contract in terms of number of sites with the potential to generate over US $75 million in gross revenue over the course of five years. The contract includes an automatic renewal for an additional 5 years.
South Africa: Google has announced its intention to establish a Google Cloud region in South Africa - its first on the continent. South Africa will be joining Google Cloud's global network of 35 cloud regions and 106 zones worldwide. It has also launched Google Wallet in South Africa.
Angola: Angola launched its AngoSat-2 communications satellite yesterday (12 October) aboard the Proton-M Blok DM-03 rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, reports Africanews.space. The high-throughput satellite (HTS) is based on the Eurostar-3000 platform with a design lifespan of 15 years, enabling near-complete Ku-Band coverage of southern Africa plus C-Band coverage of the entire African continent and a significant part of southern Europe. It lost the first satellite it launched in 2017.
MENA revenue-based financing company has announced the completion of its $3.6M seed round. The round included participation from Bolt by QED, Outliers, Nclude, and A15. FlapKap enables e-commerce businesses to scale and grow by targeting businesses that have traditionally had limited access to bank or venture capital financing. FlapKap offers these businesses the ability to scale their inventory and digital ads now, while flexibly paying later through its revenue-based financing model.
TLcom Capital, the Africa-focussed venture capital firm, has launched a call for applications for the fourth edition of its annual Africa Tech Female Founder Summit, which will take place on Wednesday 9th November 2022 in Nairobi, Kenya.
Namibian operator Mobile Telecommunications (MTC) has now deployed 475km of fibre-optic backbone cabling to alleviate congestion on its network, reports Namibia Economist. As part of the NAD100 million (USD5.5 million) deployment, fibre has been installed in Pionierspark Extension 1, Dorado Park, Olympia, Kleine Kuppe, Elisenheim, Ambrose Village, Grace Court (Khomasdal) and Auas Breeze (Cimbebasia) areas of Windhoek, as well as in the coastal suburb of Langstrand.
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Kenya: Airtel Kenya has announced the formal separation of its mobile money business from its telecoms operations. As such, the Airtel Money business has now been transferred from Airtel Networks Kenya Limited to Airtel Money Kenya Limited. Following this business separation, Airtel Money Kenya Limited will take over and continue the provision of Airtel Money services, in collaboration with the licensed telecoms network of Airtel Networks Kenya Limited.
Zimbabwe: Telecel is expected to be placed under corporate rescue, a form of bankruptcy protection, due to 'serious financial distress'. According to a report from The Herald, David Mhambare, the secretary general of the Communication and Allied Service Workers Union of Zimbabwe, is cited in a high court application as saying: 'The ... conditions indicate the existence of a material uncertainty that may cast significant doubt on the company's ability to continue operating as a going concern. If the solvency position of Telecel does not receive prime attention, it will inevitably go under liquidation.' At 31 December 2021 Telecel's liabilities outweighed its assets by a factor of sixteen to one.
Alibaba Global Initiatives (AGI), a professional training arm of Alibaba Group (https://www.AlibabaGroup.com/), today enrolled the second class of more than 360 African entrepreneurs for its Alibaba Netpreneur Training program at a virtual opening ceremony with support from the Africa's Business Heroes prize competition, a philanthropic initiative that aims to support and inspire the next generation of African entrepreneurs. Scheduled to run from today to November 10, the training seeks to equip entrepreneurs and business leaders across different sectors with tangible and actionable steps they can take to advance in the digital economy. Its launch comes after the success of the inaugural class, which graduated 70 African participants last October.
