Liquid Cloud and Microsoft have sealed a pact to deploy a hybrid cloud infrastructure that will enable businesses with cloud services across Africa.
This move is hinged on the understanding and hope by the two technology solution providers that infrastructure expansion accelerates digital transformation and facilitates a connected African continent.
Microsoft disclosed in a statement obtained by BusinessDay in Lagos that, through its Africa Transformation Office (ATO), it will work together with Liquid Cloud to deliver resilient cloud solutions using its colocation and connectivity capabilities.
It added that it would also be carrying out this enabling business alongside Microsoft Azure Stack HCI (hyperconverged infrastructure) and Azure Arc technology.
“The result enables customers in markets such as Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe to meet regulatory and data residency requirements, address low latency workloads, strengthen resilience, and enable business continuity,” the company assured.
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Expectation is that the hybrid cloud environment will extend Azure capabilities, enabling customers to create cloud-native applications faster with Azure Platform as a Service (PaaS) and data services such as App Service, Functions, Logic Apps, Azure SQL Managed Instance, PostgreSQL database, and Azure machine learning.
It is expected that, as a result of that, customers will be able to innovate anywhere and use the Azure platform to bring new solutions to life–to solve today’s challenges and create the future.
“We witnessed an accelerated adoption of cloud technologies in Africa, and businesses are now reaping the benefits of their investment. Our customers are increasingly moving to a hybrid work culture, meaning the demand for cloud-based services will only grow,” David Behr, CEO of Liquid Cloud and Cyber Security, said.
“Our partnership will enable us to build comprehensive and edge-based cloud capabilities that meet customer regulatory requirements and ensure that they deliver value to their customers,” Behr added.
He explained that critical infrastructure enablers were needed to provide access to the cloud to accelerate digital transformation and the adoption of digital technologies.
Wael Elkabbany, General Manager, Africa Regional Cluster, Microsoft, hopes that working with Liquid Cloud, access to the local cloud would be available to more organizations and highly regulated industries across the continent.
“In addition, hybrid cloud provides in-country resources that address data residency, latency, and storage requirements,” Elkabbany noted.
