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Microsoft is building its datacentres in Africa in Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa to deliver cloud services, including Microsoft Azure, Office 365, and Dynamics 365 among others.
With initial availability anticipated in 2018, the new cloud regions will offer enterprise-grade reliability and performance combined with data residency to help enable the tremendous opportunity for economic growth, and increase access to cloud and internet services for organisations and people across the African continent.
“We’re excited by the growing demand for cloud services in Africa and their ability to be a catalyst for new economic opportunities,” said Scott Guthrie, executive vice president, Cloud and Enterprise Group, Microsoft Corp. “With cloud services ranging from intelligent collaboration to predictive analytics, the Microsoft Cloud delivered from Africa will enable developers to build new and innovative apps, customers to transform their businesses, and governments to better serve the needs of their citizens.”
Currently many companies in Africa rely on cloud services delivered from outside of the continent. Microsoft’s new investment will provide highly available, scalable, and secure cloud services across Africa with the option of data residency in South Africa.
Microsoft has also announced 40 regions around the world to add to its global cloud infrastructure to help accelerate new investments, and improve access to cloud and internet services for people and organisations from Cairo to Cape Town.
This announcement expands on ongoing investments in Africa, where organisations are using currently available cloud and mobile services as a platform for innovation in health care, agriculture, education, and entrepreneurship. Microsoft has been working to support local start-ups and NGOs such as M-KOPA Solar and over 500,000 SMEs utilising Microsoft cloud services.
