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IBM has said companies across the African continent are turning to its cloud solutions to drive growth strategies, accelerate digital transformation projects and mitigate the macro-economic challenges of their operating environment.

The company issued the statement yesterday at the end of its “IBM Business Nigeria 2016" event in Lagos. The statement says companies across Africa, spanning some of the fastest growing industries in the region, including telecommunications and retailing, have chosen IBM to provide IT solutions delivered as a service via IBM Cloud. This is expected to help the firms drive productivity, innovation, differentiation and competitiveness in their respective industries.

The companies include Navigation and Geocoding Technologies Ltd. (Naveo), Whogohost, Korrect Software, Serve Consulting, and IntTeck Global Systems. IBM says they are all looking to the hybrid cloud for greater flexibility, scalability and central management. This will enable them to move workloads to where they make the most sense for their business.

According to IDC, hybrid cloud is the new norm for businesses, and it predicts that more than 80 percent of enterprise IT organizations will commit to hybrid cloud architectures by 2017. TechTarget.com defines hybrid cloud as a cloud computing environment which uses a mix of on-premises, private cloud and third-party, public cloud services with orchestration between the two platforms. By allowing workloads to move between private and public clouds as computing needs and costs change, hybrid cloud gives businesses greater flexibility and more data deployment options."

A 2016 global study of hybrid cloud by the IBM Center for Applied Insights – Growing up Hybrid: Accelerating Digital Transformation – found that 500 hybrid cloud implementers from 13 countries and 23 industries are using hybrid cloud to jumpstart “next-generation” initiatives.  

“The IBM Cloud allows a company to improve business agility and capacity to quickly meet shifting customer demands,” says Tejas Mehta, General Manager, IBM Central and West Africa.” He added, “The Africa region is propelling innovation by adopting IBM Cloud. The IBM Cloud will give them the technical muscle to consistently align their operational objectives and assets with prevailing market conditions, laying a foundation for commercial sustenance and future growth.”

Using IBM’s hybrid cloud solution based on an infrastructure as a service (IaaS) model, the Mauritius-based Naveo developed Naveo One. This is an all-in-one fleet management solution offering telematics, telemetry and geographic information system (GIS) capabilities. IBM says Naveo can now focus on marketing its GPS tracking application with assurance that the infrastructure will support its growth across the nations of the Indian Ocean Islands and Africa.

Nigeria’s Whogohost is also a user of IBM Cloud solutions, and it has helped the company overcome the challenge of downtime, according to IBM. “Whogohost turned to IBM Cloud to deliver a robust, reliable and high performance cloud infrastructure that customers demand. This has resulted in a high-quality service experience for its fast- expanding clientele. The company is now well known for consistently increasing up-time, as well as effectively and flexibly meeting customer demands.”

In January 2016, IBM was ranked #1 in Hybrid by Synergy Group Research, and positioned as a leader in Hybrid Cloud Management Solutions by Forrester.