Liquid Intelligent Technologies, which is owned by Strive Masiyiwa, is spending more than R350m into delivering Software Defined Network (SDN) offering known as Dataport.
The client-controlled network can be scaled and customised to suit the datacentre and SME user market, and South Africa’s 20 000 connected buildings.
SDN connections are typically used to connect enterprise networks, including branch offices and data centres, over local and long distances.
Users have complete control over their operations through an efficient, easy-to-use web portal, from choosing destinations, speed and bandwidths, managing traffic demand, checking costs, and more. With Dataport, customers have complete oversight of services provisioned at their fingertips.
The group said it is the first African company to launch “a pan-African SDN service”. For customers, the biggest draw is the ability to control the amount of network capacity they need and use through an interface that was previously reserved for network providers.
Any business, ranging from SMEs to large enterprises, can link onto the platform and customise a service based on their require traffic routes, points-of-presence and specific market requirements.
The offering will be deployed in South Africa, Kenya and Tanzania and the United Kingdom and France in its first phase, with more countries and Points of Presence to ensure increased coverage in the future.
SDN empowers customers to take control of their network, tailor-making it to suit all of their connectivity requirements, app usage and costs.
This improved visibility allows users to define secure network pathways and offers customers better control than most other network options.
“If African businesses were to level the playing field against their counterparts in more developed economies, SDN is the answer. How we work has evolved, and our customers now expect to pay for services as they consume them,” David Eurin, CEO of Liquid Dataport, SAID.
“The flexibility we have brought customers through this solution has allowed them to select and scale their network requirements according to their individual needs and only pay for what they use”.
One of the most significant benefits of customers partnering with Liquid Dataport is that the SDN solution is deployed on Liquid’s owned network. Meaning customers can break away from the traditional approach of siloed networking and even take advantage of our extensive fibre backbone across the continent. This underscores the business’ overall commitment to providing extensive infrastructure and building on a digitised network in Africa and beyond.
