TELKOM Kenya has launched a KSh150 million ($1.49 million) data centre to boost colocation and data back-up.
The 1,160 sq m facility, located at the Milimani Exhange along Bishop Road in Nairobi’s Upper Hill, will enhance Tekom Kenya’s network quality, colocation and hosting services, internet connectivity and local loop connectivity.
According to Telkom’s chief executive officer, Aldo Mareuse, this latest investment is part of the company’s network infrastructure expansion programme. The modernised open access facility is capable of hosting all telcos’ infrastructure. Mareuse also said that the Telkom is leveraging the surge in demand for cloud-based services for Kenyan and regional businesses, at a customer‘s requirements.
‘It gives our clients three redundant fibre routes guaranteeing back-up and access to international capacity on the Submarine Cables (TEAMS, EASSy & LION2) from Nairobi, enabling us to redeploy superior services competitively beyond market offering,’ said Mareuse.
The new infrastructure, he says, provides access to national fibre backbone and metro capacities across the country whilst offering turnkey solution support for public and private cloud deployment and multi-channel access to services.
Speaking when launching the data centre, ICT Cabinet Secretary, Joe Mucheru, lauded the timely infrastructure investment amid booming data generation over the next five years. He urged enterprises entrusted with data to put in place measures to safeguard data from internal and external compromise.
‘In recent days, there have been several cyber threats locally and internationally, leading to losses by individuals and organisations. As we have learnt in the same period, the threats are not necessarily external – some cyber threats originate internally. The Government will continue to invest in initiatives that tackle the ever-evolving cyber threats to back up our readiness and timely response,’ added Mucheru.
The data centre has an ability to provide up to 4KW of IT load for 30 rack servers and has a rack area designed to accommodate up to 52U rack height with adjustments on floor footprint. It also has 3 diverse fibre routes serving the site to ensure uptime through redundancy to three different exchanges: Westlands, GPO Nairobi, and South-Hill Exchanges in Nairobi.
As part of Telkom’s rebranding last year, Telkom revamped its carrier services division, under managing director Kebaso George Mokogi, to lead Telkom’s offering of business solutions driven by the Telco’s global seamless network backbone capabilities. This division focuses on cross connect services, infrastructure sharing, international private leased circuits (national optic fibre backbone infrastructure) point-to-point and backhaul services.
Earlier this year, Telkom Kenya announced that it had applied for a European Investment Bank (EIB) loan to help fund a €75 million network expansion, set to boost mobile coverage and to improve its mobile money network.
Kenya will benefit from SEACOM’s plans to upgrade increased capacity in the country and satellite company Avanti is to provide its technology to help Kenya plan for and respond to disasters.