- Huawei Technologies, an information communication technology (ICT) infrastructure provider, reportedly plans to establish a data centre in Nigeria to comply with the country’s data storage regulations.
- The new facility, referred to as a ‘cloud site’, is expected to go live on October 31, 2024, providing data storage and computing resources for local businesses and sectors.
- This was disclosed during a keynote session by David Olaiya, Head of Cloud Fintech Business Development, Huawei Nigeria, at the Fintech Week event in Lagos, Nigeria. Olaiya also stated that Huawei’s data centre will be an extension of the company’s existing cloud infrastructure in South Africa, with a link to its data centre in Ireland.
In addition to Huawei’s global 24/7 support, the local data centre will have its support team.
According to Olaiya, establishing a local data centre will address data sovereignty and compliance concerns, improve local availability, and lower latency levels.
“This initiative comes in response to the Nigeria Data Protection Regulation (NDPR), which mandates that Nigerian user data must be stored within the country,” Olaiya stated.
He emphasised that many companies that use foreign cloud services face compliance challenges because data is frequently sent across borders.
While mentioning that Huawei’s data centre will enable businesses to keep their data within Nigeria, he added that fintech companies, which require strict adherence to data protection laws, would also benefit from it.
Huawei Cloud boasts 93 availability zones across 33 regions globally, though it currently has data centre regions only in South Africa and Egypt.
In Egypt, Telecom Egypt and Huawei Cloud entered into a strategic partnership to establish Huawei’s first locally-based public cloud platform to support the country’s digital transformation strategy.
In April 2024, Huawei Cloud announced plans to support 100 Nigerian startups to innovate and grow on Huawei Cloud over the next two years.
Moreover, in early May 2024, the Nigerian government announced plans to open a data centre capable of storing up to 1.4 petabytes of data by the end of the month, to house critical national information, such as citizens’ biometric data.
