Availability of affordable connectivity and improved budgetary allocations by companies and governments have allowed increased investments in cloud services in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Google, MTN, Internet Solutions and Vodacom Group provide a large percentage of cloud services, driven by affordable connectivity, although the feeling is that there is need for awareness on the value of cloud services.
The companies are offering hosted exchange, security, file-sharing applications, back up, VoIP, and other infrastructure services that run through MPLS platforms and are considered more secure. Mobile service providers such as MTN and Vodacom have set up data centers in several African countries while Internet Solutions is setting up its data centers outside southern Africa.
"The uptake of cloud computing, particularly Google Apps, is highly dependent on good connectivity and lower access costs -- countries with improvements in this area are leading the way in uptake," said Julie Taylor, Africa communications manager for Google.
Governments are expected to lead in adoption of cloud services with many services going online and connectivity efforts being pushed to the rural areas but corporations are also gaining confidence in services in the market.
"We are seeing a strong push from government to get its services in to the cloud space and the budget backing helps, but larger corporations in the private sector are now viewing cloud services as an option for their upgrade paths and are also starting to find confidence in the outsource model," said Loren Bosch, sales director, Internet Solutions Kenya.
The commercial drive for better performance and uptime from critical systems and communication platforms is driving the uptake for both public and private sector.
While South Africa leads in technology adoption at all levels, there are projections for a shift from countries with no legacy systems. Rwanda, Nigeria and Kenya are some of the countries investing heavily in technology.
Security of the cloud is a major concern for many corporations. Some are concerned about who has access to their vital information while others are concerned at the lack of data protection legislation in many countries that would bind service providers and provide legal redress.
"Security is one of the key pillars of cloud and we need to demonstrate trust so that people can use the services online. Devices are becoming more converged and people need to be more comfortable that their information is secure," said Angela Gahagan, managing executive in charge of the ISP business at MTN Business.
Growth of mobile connectivity, availability of affordable smartphones and increased Internet penetration to homes are also seen as major drivers to cloud adoption as more people work outside their offices. But Google feels there is a need for increased awareness.
"An overall lack of awareness and understanding about cloud computing still hampers potential, especially in the SME. We are working towards raising awareness about the huge opportunity and potential of cloud computing and contributing towards reducing access barriers," Taylor said.
A recent upsurge in government attention to business process outsourcing is likely to provide cost and efficiency benefits to companies but e-government services are expected to provide more cloud business.
"We have seen increased attention from the treasury, which means increased budgetary allocations to BPO and other services. The government is investing in managed services but awareness is key," said Paul Kukubo, CEO of the Kenya ICT Board, which assists government departments in ICT-related procurement.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Rebecca Wanjiku
Quelle/Source: Computerworld Kenya, 24.11.2010
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