InterviewTelecommunicationTop 20 CEOs [ICT] SPECIAL APPEARANCE

ICT Watch Magazine TOP 20 CEO’s exclusive interview with ENGR IKE NNAMANI, CEO of Medallion Data Centres

Engr. Ike Nnamani. CEO, Medallion Data Centres
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Q: Why did you decide to split medallion communications?
 
A: It’s about growth. We realized that our two arms of business needed to grow and it got to the point where it had to exist separately. The data center business was expanding and we needed to grow to international standard and our voice interconnect business is also going through a revolution and we have some new bigger things we want to do so we felt for the kind of partnership we need to build,especially on the data center side, it was important to split both arms of our operations which we’ve done successfully and we’re very happy for that.
 
 
Q: Successfully which companies are now broken away from Medallion Communications?
 
A: So the two resulting entities are TeleAfrica which is now going to manage the voice interconnect business and some new class of service we intend to roll out within this year and medallion data center which will manage the data center arm of our previous business.
 
Q:What are those things we’ll be expecting from the medallion data center knowing that data is the new oil of the digital economy?
 
A: Medallion has been the number 1 pairing hall for the industry,not just in Nigeria but pretty much across West Africa. We are the number 1 connectivity data center where every critical infrastructure that runs the digital economy and ICT sector is located. We’ve done this for over 10 years and what we’ve decided to do is to take it to international level which was what led to the transaction we did with digital royalty pretty much the biggest data center operator globally and that has given us the capacity to do much more bigger and more international class data center services which is what we’re currently doing.
We’re massively expanding our data center facilities both within Nigeria and across the subregion. It is good and positive for the region,as a matter of fact, as you noted by virtue of what we’ve done we’ve also seen some new international players coming in once our transaction was announced and people saw that things were being taken to the next level. For many years we’ve been clamoring that the hyper scalers who are the people that really control global content should come into Nigeria. We don’t have any hyper scaler in Nigeria today.
The closest we have in Africa is South Africa but we’re determined to bring them into the country but to do that and for them to come, we must have the kind of infrastructure that they enjoy globally in other much more developed parts of the world and that is what we’re doing. We’re building that kind of infrastructure that the top global players would be comfortable to host their core content within it. It is a positive development and we can’t wait to see how this plays out over the next few years.
 
 
Q: Just in rounding up, the telecoms companies who are interested in trying to bring back their data centers, their hosting rights especially into the country since there are a lot of decisions by government that you must host especially for the government agencies,why should you be the preferred?
 
A: Our track record is there over the last 10 years and if you really know and understand who digital royalty is, they are the number 1 globally so it is a no brainier that this is the party to do business with because we’re going to operate at the top level of the industry in terms of quality of service, the robustness of the infrastructure and robustness of the service delivery.
I don’t think by the time we fully roll out our new data center there’s going to be any other company that can match that and that is because we are combining the Nigeria flavor that medallion has been known with over the years with the international flavor that the digital royalty has been known with over the years so it’s like the best of both worlds coming together to offer something so unique and indigenous to our environment, customized to the need of the country and that is where we’re going to and again as I said, we believe the industry should grow so we expect there should be other players also, international players coming in to also play in this space but at the end people will make the right decisions when they realize what they need.
It is all going to come down to people’s business need and going to a place where they know it’ll be met in a very efficient and cost effective way and that is what medallion data center brings.

 

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