It’s time to take a golden rush to the cloud says Angani

Computing resources have become cheaper, more powerful and more available than ever before, following the recent rapid development of processing and storage technologies that are coupled with success of the Internet said Waikwa Wambugu, COO Angani Limited while justifying the reason why public institutions and business enterprises should take a golden rush to the cloud.

This technological trend has enabled the realisation of a cloud computing, in which resources are provided as general utilities that can be leased and released by users through the Internet in an on-demand fashion, said Wambugu during the recent Cloud and Security Summit, in Kigali, Rwanda organised by CIO East Africa in-conjunction with Rwanda Information Society Authority (RISA).

He noted that some companies are moving towards cloud computing just because it is the latest trend in information technology, others have developed for a long time a wait-and-see approach while some cannot even take into consideration the idea of having their sensitive data outside their premises.

“Adopting cloud should be result of a very well informed analysis,” said Wambugu adding that among the factors would include: integration with existing IT infrastructure and existing software, costs, return on investment, performances, security.

“Cloud-based computing, networking and storage infrastructure, and cloud-native applications, are now firmly on the radar of IT managers – be they in startups, small businesses or large enterprises. A few years ago, the question facing CIOs was “Which workloads should I move to the cloud?”. It’s now becoming “Which, if any, workloads should I keep on-premises?”

Waikwa Wambugu, COO Angani Limited

Wambugu said: “Cloud-based computing, networking and storage infrastructure, and cloud-native applications, are now firmly on the radar of IT managers – be they in startups, small businesses or large enterprises. A few years ago, the question facing CIOs was “Which workloads should I move to the cloud?”. It’s now becoming “Which, if any, workloads should I keep on-premises?”

Gartner estimates show that Cloud growth will outstrip Data Centre and Hardware growth by almost 3:1 in the next 3 years.  The benefits of cloud cannot be understated organisations are gaining more experience in the cloud and they start to shift more core business functions onto cloud platforms.

Because of this fact, we are seeing that cloud adoption is significantly more complex than we imagined initially, particularly in terms of data management, system integration and the management of multiple cloud providers.

Wambugu noted that cloud computing is of growing interest to companies within Africa, but many are finding initial costs as greater obstacles to the adoption of cloud computing than they anticipated. However, this scenario has not deterred cloud computing to deliver it promises including security measures.

Pointing out that cloud was a priority for IT leads, Wambugu laid emphasis on the challenges CIO’s are facing today from the exponential increase in business expectations from their users and the bridge that cloud provides to help meet these organisation’s business requirements.

With the advent of Cloud Computing, the role of CIO’s in organisations have become more involving. Wambugu argued that CIOs now play an extremely important role in the sustainability and growth of enterprises. CIOs he said are no longer viewed as cost centres but rather key agents for innovation.

Angani (Swahili word for sky) emerges as a company with the ability to provide cloud managed solutions across East Africa. “Our rich experience in Telecom, Networks and Cloud Infrastructure – with the founders experience that spans +50 years in these areas gives Angani the acumen to render invaluable cloud services,” said Wambugu.

With local expertise, investment in infrastructure – Currently available in multiple countries in East Africa, security, affordability and robust customer service, Angani’s points of presence – In Rwanda and Kenya presently, is an assurance for organisations yearning to make a leap into the cloud. Angani on the other hand has earmarked to have point on presence in the other EA Countries in the next six months.