Equinix, Incorporated, the world’s digital infrastructure company, earlier in the month of April 2022 sealed a deal that made it to acquire West African data center and connectivity solutions provider MainOne for an enterprise value of $320 million, thereby giving it expansion into the African continent.
The completion of the acquisition augments Equinix’s long-term strategy to become a leading African carrier-neutral digital infrastructure company by being able to bring a full range of transformative technologies and connectivity to Nigeria, Ghana, and Cote d’Ivoire.
Six months down the line, while it was thought that the company is relaxing, the global digital infrastructure company, revealed what plans it had to rolled out its expansion plan for the Nigerian and West African markets in its 2022 Global Tech Trends Survey, which focused on 100 business leaders in Nigeria, in the areas of supply chain, cybersecurity and recruitment.
MainOne, an Equinix company in Lagos, Southwest Nigeria later invited technology writers to an End-of-Year Media Engagement where it disclosed that has designed the plans to augment its long-term strategy to become a leading African carrier-neutral digital infrastructure company on the continent.
The media parley had in attendance the General Manager, Corporate Services, Tinu Ipadadeola, General Manager Nigeria Sales, Bunmi Ogun and General Counsel, Abayomi Adebanjo, and the team gave insights into the landmark of the Equinix-MainOne achievements revealing the future target of West Africa’s premium carrier-of-carriers and data center market leader.
General Manager Nigeria Sales, Bunmi Ogun who took the media through the landmark achievements in a presentation revealed said MainOne would be partnering AMSIX to deploy leading global internet exchange presence in Lagos, which will increase local peering of traffic in Nigeria.
“It will also extend Equinix fibre to Lagos, to enable interconnection of Lagos Data Centres with Equinix Data Centres globally, while using AfriConnect Service offering to bring new content providers to West Africa,” Ogun said.
In her presentation, she revealed how since acquisition, its data center, MDXi, an Equinix Company built in 2015 a data center facility of 600 rack capacity with Uptime Tier 111 certification and in 2021 in Accra, Ghana, built a phase development 104 rack facility with Uptime Tier 111 capacity certification.
At its Lagos 11 data center, MainOne again built in 2022 a phase development of 520 capacity rack that also has Uptime Tier 111 capacity certification while in Abidjan constructed a modular of up to 100 rack center facility.
Reeling further some of the landmark achievements since the acquisition, she said that as part of the expansion of its fiber optic network infrastructure, MainOne decided to launch a Fiber Infrastructure at the Lagos Free Zone.
The project was in partnership with Lagos Free Zone and was designed to provide strategic value to forward-thinking businesses who seek to enjoy the ease of doing business.
Also, the fiber infrastructure at the Zone was also designed to offer stress experience of increased speed, security, and connectivity in The New Frontier with MainOne.
“Customers will also enjoy access to local data centers and other local and global service providers through the MainOne data center with connections directly from the Zone”, the company had said in statement at the time of the unveiling.
Another major landmark highlighted was the holding of the Nerds Unite 2022 event by MainOne as an Equinix Company, a highly engaging annual event, which had that year the theme: ‘The Power of Global Interconnection’.
That year, it featured a keynote address on Interconnection and the power of the global Equinix Platform to connect African Businesses and Global/Local Service providers, delivered by Vice President, Growth and Emerging Markets, Equinix, Judith Gardiner.
Being the first after the acquisition, it had in attendance leaders from Equinix such as Martin Atkinson, Senior Manager, Peering & Interconnection EMEA, Equinix including Edge Strategy Manager, SSA, Meta, Ben Ryall; CEO, Tizeti, Kendall Ananyi; CTO, Lagos Free Zone, Nikhil Khandelwal; Country Manager, HPE operated by Selectium, Ifeyinwa Kojo; Head, Technology Infrastructure, Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS), Eunice King; Group Head, Network Operations, Access Bank, Adebowale Shonekan; CIO, EKO Electricity Distribution Company (EKEDC), J.P. Attueyi; and Partner, Enterprise Technology & Performance Leader, Deloitte, Oluwole Oyeniran.
It was gathering of titans of the global tech space where the Chief Executive Officer, MainOne, an Equinix company, Funke Opeke remarked; “It’s the first time following MainOne’s acquisition that we’d be hosting our annual flagship event, Nerds Unite. It is also at a time business we are just recovering from COVID-19 pandemic and are faced with new challenges coping with the accelerating rate of digitalisation. We hope ICT stakeholders find this event very useful, especially with our parent company Equinix billed to share their knowledge of global data interconnection and outsourcing”.
Also worth noting is the signed Memorandum of Understanding to operate and grow Internet Exchange services in Africa by AMS-IX, one of the largest Internet Exchange operators in the world, and MainData Nigeria Limited (MDXi), an Equinix company.
As admitted by the International Partnership Director Onno Bos of AMS-IX during the ceremony: “Lagos is the ideal location to serve as a content hub for West and Central Africa as it is strategically located in a fast-developing region with landing sites for international subsea cables connecting Africa to EMEA and beyond. We’re thrilled to work with such a strong partner as MainOne to expand this vibrant connectivity community.”
According to the General Manager, Corporate Services, Tinu Ipadadeola while explaining further during the question and answers session, landmark achievements were also recorded in MainOne, an Equinix company corporate social responsibility strides, and one of such was the induction of MainOne new cohort of graduate trainee.
She noted as had earlier stated by the General Manager Nigeria Sales, Bunmi Ogun that the trainee unlike in some organisations are not mandated to stay with the Company but noted that most of them resolved to stay back and that the company was glad to retain them.
Looking into the future in its 2024 plan, MainOne-Equinix is expanding its data center and committing funds towards the Lekki Campus Development that will deliver 10,000 megawatts capacity by the end of 2024.
The plan also includes Lagos 1 additional power expansion, Lagos 2 expansion additional power and rack capacity, Lagos 3 expansion of Saka Tinubu hub to provide full complement of Equinix interconnection services by 2024 as well as the Lagos 4 additional development of six megawatts.
Leave a Reply