Business
What is behind IBM’s pro-Africa focus? – IBM ramping up investment on the continent
What is behind IBM’s pro-Africa focus?
Africa is a key part of IBM’s geo-expansion strategy. Africa, China, India and Brazil are all fast-growing economies and, as such, are part of IBM’s global geo-expansion drive. The world’s emerging markets have tremendous growth opportunities, thanks to the transformative powers of extant technologies.
IBM has, in recent times, made substantial investments in Nigeria, Senegal, Ghana and Kenya. IBM recently established its first research laboratory on the continent in Kenya. What informed the choice of Kenya over Nigeria, and what does this portend for the growth of technology in Africa?
The lab is manned by a multinational team of professionals, researchers and scientists, majority of whom are Africans
A lot of people think or visualize Africa as one country. But it is not as homogeneous as it sounds. Every region or country in Africa has its own challenges. Learning to deal with them is very important. Putting in place strategic management and business control measures specific to each country is one of our strategies of dealing with these challenges. We are learning a lot and re-injecting our learning into our strategic road map.
In Ghana, IBM recently built a customized data center for Ghana’s Fidelity Bank. What does this portend for Ghana?
IBM is a leading data services company and the leading provider of data centers globally. The Fidelity Bank deal was a competitive one. Our team in Ghana successfully convinced the management of Fidelity Bank Ghana to go with IBM’s data center solution. The bank has its sights set on its growth plans and wanted a database management solution that was scale-able and able to cater to its expanding service delivery obligations. Clearly, our ongoing relationship with Fidelity Bank means that the bank’s customers, and by extension the Ghanaian environment, will be benefiting from the latest data center technology.
