ChannelVision Sept-Oct 2017

So the risks of storing and manag- ing data in sub-standard facilities are significant. 2. Data Proximity Equally problematic is the storing of data in facilities outside the African continent. It may well be kept in pro- fessional colocation facilities that do not have any of the security concerns outlined above, but the lack of proxim- ity to Africa-based end users regularly results in unacceptable latency when attempting to access data. And in a world where businesses and consum- ers demand instant access to every- thing – particularly streaming media – these delays are frustrating for users and service providers alike. Added to this, there is a growing push toward new laws mandating not only that companies conduct them- selves responsibly when collecting, processing, storing and sharing peo- ple’s personal information, but that this data must be stored on servers physi- cally located within the country’s bor- ders. Nigeria has already implemented such legislation, Kenya is about to follow suit and a number of other coun- tries are exploring similar rules. So increasing the proximity of data to its ultimate users is critical from a customer satisfaction perspective and increasingly from regulatory perspec- tives too. 3. Lack of Resources The money, materials and precision equipment required to build modern data centres are very hard to find in Africa. The assumption is often made that standard brick and mortar buildings can be built or converted for data centre use. The reality though is that traditional construction methods are typically not adequate to house mission critical ICT infrastructure – especially in Africa where environmental and weather ex- tremes can deliver significant challenges to even the highest specified facilities. And Africa’s data centre resource issues are not simply material. More significant still is the lack of local expertise, not only in designing and building new data centres but also in managing them on an ongoing basis. This skills shortage is actively being addressed, but it will likely remain a challenge for the foreseeable future. Regardless of the issues described above, the data boom that the conti- nent has been experiencing for some time is now clearly fuelling an African data centre boom. New profession- ally built and maintained facilities are needed across the continent as a mat- ter of urgency, and this is providing opportunities not only for the traditional players in the ICT world but also for entrepreneurs looking to establish entirely new service opportunities with dedicated colocation and data hosting facilities. The question is where these new facilities are going to come from? The Answer is Prefabrication One answer to addressing Africa’s immediate need for more data centres is prefabrication. Prefabricated data centres, such as Flexenclosure’s eCen- tre, are built off-site in clean-room fac- tories where they are also pre-equipped and fully tested before being deployed and commissioned in-country. In this way, construction costs and timescales can be managed with far greater ac- curacy and the data centres are built by a team of professionals highly experi- enced in delivering Tier-certified facili- ties – all of which contribute to signifi- cantly reducing project risk. Traditionally constructed buildings’ inherent inflexibility means that they are typically built over-sized in the hope that the business will ultimately fill it – an extremely inefficient use of capital. By contrast, the modular nature of prefabricated facilities allows capex to be more accurately managed during the initial build phase and to be tightly kept in line with the growth of the busi- ness over time. So future expansion can be undertaken exactly when the business needs greater capacity and without interrupting ongoing data centre operations. As a result, prefabricated facilities, as they expand, also can take advantage of new technologies that may not have been available during the first phase of the project. And critically, given Africa’s immedi- ate need for new data centres, a pre- fabricated approach will always deliver fully commissioned facilities in a frac- tion of the time it would take to build a traditional brick and mortar one. And that means faster service improve- ments for service users and faster time to revenue for service providers. It’s clear that Africa needs a lot of new data centres, and fast. The good news is that prefabricated facilities are clearly the right solution for Africa’s short, medium and long-term data cen- tre needs. o Sybrand Pretorius is sales director at Flexenclosure. He has significant experi- ence in the ICT industry in both engi- neering and sales roles, and since 2014 has been responsible for data centre sales into the African market. Operating eCentre in Sudan International Agents Channel Vision | September - October, 2017 48