Business Connexion (BCX), a Telkom-owned technology firm, is planning to accelerate the expansion of its converged cloud computing services offering in the coming months. By Gugu Lourie
The South African-based technology firm is hoping that its converged cloud services are likely to benefit from tough economic times and through the reverse integration of Cybernest by Telkom into BCX.
“I think this is magnificent for us to be driving the cloud with consolidation of Cybernest. I think in terms of the data centres and the real estate we will be enjoying, we are certainly growing our cloud with our tech vendors,” BCX CEO Isaac Mophatlane told TechFinancials.co.za in an exclusive interview.
Telkom has began to reverse integrate Cybernest into BCX to create a formidable standalone ICT (information, communications and technology) business.
Cybernest, which was founded in 2009, has six fully-fledged data centres, with close to 600 specialised data staff, managing in excess of R2.5 billion worth of IT assets.
It operates 9,700m2 of data centre space. In the 2014 financial year, Cybernest generated R347 million in revenues, reflecting a 69% rise compared to the same period in 2013.
Mophatlane explains: “So, we are working quite hard with the likes of Oracle, SAP, Cisco, Microsoft to accelerate our cloud computing strategy.”
Furthermore, the South African economy like many other economies was experiencing tough times. During this difficult period technology customers were likely to consider outsourcing to create efficiencies.
“We see that as a huge opportunity, quite honestly, if you are a bank or whatever industry you are in you may say I want to stick to my core business and let people like BCX come in. So, we see that as a real opportunity to drive our cloud computing strategy as well as outsourcing,” said Mophatlane.
Such developments could open opportunities for BCX, which aims to become an established cloud computing and virtualisation provider in Africa.
The company, which has operations in in Botswana, Kenya, Namibia, Nigeria, Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia, offers various cloud services.
