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The Rise of the African Cloud: Azure, AWS, Vmware and the Battle to Transform African Enterprise Markets

  • Report

  • 128 Pages
  • March 2019
  • Region: Africa
  • Xalam Analytics
  • ID: 4756915

By of 2019, at Least Four Hyperscale Data Centers will Become Operational in the African Continent, Offering Hundreds of Enterprise and Consumer Services from Within Africa’s Shores

The African cloud has arrived. While the cloud services sector is in its early stages of development, the impact of cloud services is already far-reaching. African banks are making investments in machine learning and artificial intelligence tools to improve the customer experience and credit risk; new "digital banks" are emerging, that are, at least in part, cloud-based. Governments are using cloud and virtualized infrastructure to enhance public service delivery. Large retail firms are using compute capabilities and AWS databases to transform how they reach a predominantly mobile and digital customer base. And scores of African cloud-native startups are leveraging the cloud to disrupt entire industry sectors.

The African cloud may be small, but it is already here indeed, and it is growing fast. For African markets, cloud, virtualization and the broader evolution towards serverless computing are the most disruptive technology developments since the advent of the mobile payment revolution. Few other segments in the African ICT space are as likely to generate an incremental $2bn in top line revenue over the next five years, and at least as much in adjacent enabling ecosystem revenue.

This report is about the near term economic, commercial and investor value opportunity offered by the rise of the African cloud. Building on the author’s established analysis of African enterprise and digital infrastructure markets, 18 months of research and 100+ interviews and conversations, The Rise of the African Cloud explores the readiness of African markets for thriving private and public cloud services; it analyzes cloud demand and use case patterns, at segment level, from financial services to the public sector and startups; it estimates and projects cloud services market size; it details the competitive strengths of global hyperscale cloud providers and how their battle is translating in the African context; it outlines the impact of cloud services on Africa’s managed service provider ecosystem and telcos’ evolving enterprise businesses; and it breaks down the investment case within the African cloud value chain, from enterprise connectivity to data centers and SaaS.

This report does not pretend to have all the answers. But it does offer, at long last, the most comprehensive picture available on African cloud services markets.

This report includes a report in PDF format, chart data in Excel, and a 20-slide executive Synopsis (PDF).

Table of Contents


EXECUTIVE SUMMARYPART I - BREAKING DOWN AFRICA’S READINESS & DEMAND FOR CLOUD SERVICES
ARE AFRICAN MARKETS READY FOR PUBLIC CLOUD SERVICES?
  • Rating Africa’s cloud readiness (1)
  • How we rate cloud readiness (2) - an explanation
  • Verdict: Only 5 cloud-ready markets, a dozen "nearly ready" as of 2018
  • 2021 projections: More cloud-ready markets, but most will be near-ready only


DECIPHERING AFRICAN DEMAND FOR CLOUD SERVICES
  • Africa cloud adoption - sample views by country
  • Why they use the cloud - African established banks
  • Why they use the cloud - Africa’s emerging fintechs
  • How they use the cloud - African financial services
  • Why and how they use the cloud - African retail
  • Why they use the cloud - the African public sector
  • How they use the cloud - African public sector
  • African startups and the cloud - Starting small, with considerable scale potential
  • How they use the cloud - African startups


PART II AFRICAN CLOUD MARKET SIZE & INVESTOR VALUE
HOW BIG IS THE AFRICAN CLOUD SERVICES MARKET?
  • African (total) cloud services: a ~$1.7bn market
  • The African public cloud: growing 3x faster than the global average
  • The African cloud market: South Africa, then everybody else
  • The private cloud still dominates - but the public cloud is picking up
  • SaaS is still the larger category - but IaaS is growing 2x faster


WHAT IS THE REVENUE UPSIDE FOR CLOUD SERVICES IN AFRICA - AND WHERE IS IT?
  • Africa cloud forecasts: a snapshot
  • The upside: the African cloud services market will double in size over the next five years
  • The upside: the African cloud will be mostly private, and increasingly hybrid
  • Where African cloud growth lies - IaaS
  • Where the growth lies: South Africa, then everybody else
  • Where the growth lies: Other African markets


WHERE IS THE INVESTOR VALUE IN THE AFRICAN CLOUD?
  • The global cloud services investor value: $700bn in market capitalization
  • Looking for value in the African public cloud
  • Looking for value in the African cloud


PART III - WHO WILL WIN THE AFRICAN CLOUD? A KEY PLAYER ANALYSIS
AZURE, AWS, HUAWEI AND THE BATTLE OF THE HYPERSCALE
  • The hyperscale battle for the African cloud
  • The hyperscale cloud in Africa: AWS, Azure lead, others follow
  • Building up: global cloud player Africa presence
  • Azure: An Office 365-driven dominance - but facing stiff challenge on IaaS and PaaS
  • AWS: Lacking Microsoft’s African presence and reach - but stronger on IaaS
  • The others: Google lagging, Oracle and the strong VMWare challenge
  • The others: Huawei emerging, OVH dominates French-speaking West Africa
  • The hyperscale cloud in Africa: how they stack up
  • What African cloud customers are buying - a snapshot
  • Hyperscale cloud - key African customers by key platform


WILL GLOBAL CLOUD PLAYERS WRECK THE AFRICAN MSP MARKET - OR WILL THEY REJUVENATE IT?
  • African MSPs: the new dinosaurs?
  • Surviving the hyperscale: playing it local, navigating the cloud minefield, and the VMWare factor
  • Mapping African cloud MSPs
  • The outlook for the African MSP
  • The local stars of the African cloud - Node Africa, Cloud Temple, Routed and the others


DOES THE RISE OF THE PUBLIC CLOUD MAKE AFRICAN TELCOS IRRELEVANT IN THE CLOUD SERVICES SPACE?
  • How African telcos play the cloud market
  • The cloud outlook for African telcos: not as dire as it may seem


PART IV COUNTRY ANALYSIS
STATE OF CLOUD: SOUTH AFRICA
  • South Africa cloud market summary
  • South Africa: cloud infrastructure readiness
  • Africa’s best cloud demand fundamentals
  • South Africa cloud service adoption - awareness is strong, pace of adoption is uneven
  • A strong impetus for migration in the financial and retail sectors
  • South Africa’s public sector cloud push
  • The supply side: South Africa’s cloud services value chain
  • Mapping South African cloud MSPs
  • South Africa cloud providers: service portfolio mapping
  • SA cloud players: Azure and AWS lead the way - VMWare is right up there too
  • SA cloud players: IBM holding, Google Cloud lagging, Huawei starting
  • Hyperscale cloud channels in South Africa
  • The SA telco cloud: from connectivity enablers to reselling IaaS and building SaaS marketplaces
  • Who are they using? Key cloud enterprise contracts in South Africa
  • How big is the South African cloud?
  • The South Africa cloud opportunity - time for take-off
  • The South Africa cloud opportunity - IaaS and SaaS


STATE OF CLOUD: KENYA
  • Kenya cloud market summary
  • Kenya: cloud infrastructure readiness
  • The Kenyan impetus for cloud services: innovate or die = more cloud
  • Kenya cloud service adoption - rising fast
  • Kenya demand for cloud services - Financials and the public sector lead the way
  • The supply side: Kenya’s cloud services value chain
  • The global cloud providers in Kenya: AWS, Azure, and a surprising Oracle
  • The telcos and MSPs - Enough competitive room to serve the SME market
  • Kenya cloud providers: service portfolio mapping
  • Who are they using? Key cloud enterprise contracts in Kenya
  • How big is the Kenyan cloud?
  • The Kenyan cloud opportunity - revenue slated to double


STATE OF CLOUD: NIGERIA
  • Nigeria cloud market summary
  • Nigeria: cloud infrastructure readiness
  • Nigeria and the cloud: few need it more; few trust it less
  • Nigeria demand for cloud services - Financials and e-commerce lead the way
  • The supply side: Nigeria’s cloud services value chain
  • The Nigerian cloud market - still an open field
  • Alternative telcos and MSPs lead the way
  • Who are they using? Sample cloud enterprise contracts in Nigeria
  • How big is the Nigerian cloud?
  • The Nigerian cloud opportunity - all upside - and subject to supply conditions


CLOUD MARKET OVERVIEW: MOROCCO, EGYPT, IVORY COAST AND GHANA
  • Cote-d’Ivoire: Still discovering the cloud
  • Egypt: cloud potential held up by supply-side challenges
  • Ghana: cloud market still small - but looking up
  • Morocco: deep potential demand - but slow uptake


List of Charts
  • Africa cloud readiness scores - 2018 E*
  • Africa cloud readiness scores - 2021 E
  • African financials use of cloud services - breakdown by application type
  • Sample African cloud contracts - Financial services
  • African retail use of cloud services - breakdown by application type
  • Sample African cloud contracts - Retail
  • African public sector use of cloud services - breakdown by application type
  • Sample African public sector cloud deals
  • African startup use of cloud services - breakdown by application type
  • Sample African cloud contracts - African Startups
  • Africa cloud services market size - an overview
  • Public cloud services revenue - Africa vs. the world - 2018 E (US$ billion)
  • A country distribution of Africa’s total cloud revenue - 2018 E - USD bn
  • A map of Africa’s public cloud revenue - 2018 E - USD m
  • Public cloud - revenue by cloud service type - 2018 E
  • Public cloud - Distribution of key cloud contracts by category - 2018 E*
  • Africa cloud services market - 2017-23 forecast
  • Growth outlook: Africa cloud services vs. other key ICT segments
  • Africa private cloud services contribution to enterprise services market - 2017-23 forecast
  • Growth outlook: private cloud vs. public cloud
  • Africa public cloud services revenue - 2017-23 forecast
  • Africa public cloud - revenue by cloud service category
  • Evolution of total cloud revenue by region - 2018 vs. 2021
  • Total cloud revenue growth by region - 2018-23 CAGR
  • Evolution of total cloud revenue - Sample Sub-Saharan African country view - 2018 vs. 2023
  • Where the Cloud Value Lies - Bessemer Valuer Partners Cloud Roadmap 2013
  • Where the Cloud Value Lies - Private Cloud Companies with Market Cap >$1bn
  • Key African cloud infrastructure and services segments*
  • Global cloud provider Cloud CDN and Data Center presence in Africa - Q1 2019
  • Global Cloud provider Africa channel base - 2018 E
  • Global cloud provider Africa cloud PoPs and data center launch targets
  • Table: The hyperscale cloud in Africa: how they stack up
  • Key cloud solutions purchased by enterprises - cloud contract tracker (2018 E)
  • Hyperscale cloud - key African customers by key platform
  • African cloud service provider mapping
  • African MSP cloud evolution: who is most at risk?
  • Proportion of enterprises using cloud services in South Africa - by Segment*
  • Proportion of enterprises using cloud services in South Africa - view by service type**
  • Table: South Africa’s cloud services value chain
  • South African cloud service provider mapping
  • Table: South Africa cloud providers: service portfolio mapping
  • Uneven channels: South Africa cloud partner base by key global cloud provider
  • Uneven channels: Providers with direct cloud connections from South African locations*
  • Who are they using? Key cloud enterprise contracts in South Africa
  • South African cloud market size
  • South Africa cloud services revenue projections
  • South Africa public cloud services revenue projections - by category
  • Proportion of enterprises using cloud services in Kenya - by Segment
  • Proportion of enterprises using cloud services Kenya - view by service type
  • Table: Kenya’s cloud services value chain
  • Table: Kenya cloud providers: service portfolio mapping
  • Who are they using? Key cloud enterprise contracts in Kenya
  • Kenya cloud market size
  • Kenya cloud services revenue projections
  • Kenya public cloud services revenue - by service category
  • Table: Nigeria’s cloud services value chain
  • Nigeria cloud solutions providers by platform - 2018
  • Who are they using? Sample cloud enterprise contracts in Nigeria
  • Nigeria cloud market size
  • Nigeria cloud services revenue projections
  • Morocco cloud services revenue estimates
  • Egypt cloud services revenue estimates
  • Ghana cloud services revenue estimates
  • Cote-d’Ivoire cloud services revenue estimates

Samples

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Companies Mentioned

  • 21st Century Limited
  • Absa
  • Amazon Web Services
  • Angani
  • Bank Zero
  • BCX
  • Cloud Africa
  • Cloud Temple
  • Comercio Nigeria
  • Descasio
  • Digital Ocean
  • Dimension Data/Internet Solutions
  • Dotmodus
  • Equity Bank
  • Gijima
  • Globacom
  • Google
  • Huawei
  • IBM
  • Inwi Business
  • Konga
  • Liquid Telecom
  • MainOne
  • Maroc Telecom
  • Microsoft
  • M-Kopa
  • MTN Business
  • Nedbank
  • Node Africa
  • Nutanix
  • OLX
  • Oracle
  • Orange Business Services
  • OVH
  • Pick n Pay
  • Routed
  • Safaricom
  • Sage
  • Siatik
  • Sidian Bank
  • Sidmach
  • SITA South Africa
  • Spar Group
  • Telecom Egypt
  • Teraco
  • Tymebank
  • VMWare
  • Vodacom Business