Every year, connected technology is becoming even more critical to our business and personal lives, as cloud applications and services, social media, e-commerce, streaming content, and gaming are all enjoying significant growth.
Research from Data Reportal says the world’s population is around 7.93 billion, with 1.4 billion in Africa, a number that the UN says growing globally by about 1% each year. Today, some 5.32 billion of the world’s population uses a mobile phone, and five billion people around the world use the Internet. The World Bank and African Development Bank report there are about 650 million mobile users in Africa, and GSMA predicts that the continent will have another 120 million mobile subscribers by 2025. Social media use continues to grow, too, with global users reaching 4.65 billion in April last year, and 326 million of these users joined social media between April 2021 and April 2022, equalling a growth of almost 900 000 new users every day. In Africa, Statista reveals the number of social media users is rising continuously, too, amounting to more than 384 million as of this year.
From these statistics, it’s easy to see why the demand for data centres is skyrocketing, as these facilities are the enablers of digital enterprise. Healthcare, finance, manufacturing, technology and retail organisations process massive volumes of information on a daily basis, data centers are critical to running their operations. These facilities are where vast amounts of data are collected, stored, processed, and distributed, and they are responsible for the backup and recovery of this data, hosting websites, e-mails, as well as collaboration services. They also are the infrastructure behind cloud storage applications, movie streaming, e-commerce transactions and online gaming communities.
Attend the webinar – 11am, 7 February 2023
Moreover, data centres are at the heart of connecting communication networks to enable users and platforms to access information remotely, and as such they are building on-ramps to, and between, a wide range of providers to enable a slew of cloud services and solutions to be accessible to users. Where once data centres were a large storage room, they have evolved into a complex intersection of connections for data use and sharing.
Experts
It is important to understand the market you are in, what data ecosystems are available and which will fit for purpose – especially when entering the African regions.
Join our panel of experts from TechCentral, Africa Data Centres, Netflix, INX-ZA, IXPN and KIXP as they weigh in on the hot topic of connectivity in Africa. They will be unpacking some key learnings they have experienced in their own ventures which will touch on the following:
- How are data centres providing access to entertainment?
- Educating and creating awareness for the connectivity and network community
- How are end users benefiting from colocation data centres?
- How do data centres support the cloud?
- IXPs and colocation
- The benefits of peering
- The cost of staying connected
- Africa expansion plans
This webinar will bring this all to life and show you what true collaboration can do for the African dream of having every business and individual connected.
There is a real opportunity for businesses and citizens alike when it comes to connecting Africa. Unlike the rest of the world, which has ageing populations, Africa’s population is young and hungry for all things digital. This generation of citizens wants to do things differently. They are energetic and innovative, and all have smartphones which are like having mini supercomputers in their pocket, and they are eager to use them, to truly participate in the digital economy.
One thing is very clear: Africa is on the cusp of a technology-led evolution and has a real opportunity to catapult itself ahead when it comes to harnessing the power of technology and taking full advantage of the latest best practices and trends, without having to experience the growing pains and stumbling blocks its international counterparts had to experience.
Africa Data Centres’ greatest dream is to help the continent realise its digital dreams and ensure that no African is left behind. The company is at the forefront of the development of a wide range of modern facilities with greater efficiencies and world-class technologies, built by Africans, for Africans. As the largest network of carrier-neutral data centres in Africa, Africa Data Centres is truly laying the foundations for Africa’s digital transformation.
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