- launches US$45m Onix Tier Four Data Centre
Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has stated that digital infrastructure investment is the next frontier, looking forward to the drive toward becoming the most digitised economy in the West African sub-region.
According to him, to rebuild a strong pandemic era economy responsive to the new means of doing business globally, there is an urgent need of investing in innovative technology to leapfrog the obstacles to inclusive development.
This, he emphasised, is based on the fact that there is no more important development revolution facing Ghana now than the fast-approaching digitisation and leveraging of technology to develop the country.
“We can point to several ongoing projects within our digitalisation agenda, namely the implementation of the property address system, unique identification through the Ghana Card, as well as mobile money interoperability; but looking forward, the next frontier lies in digital infrastructure which enables the adoption of new business processes,” he said.
In respect of that, the Vice President touted the 12-megawatt Onix facility Data Centre as the launch pad for a wave of transformation at the organisational and business process level.
Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia made these remarks in his address at the launch of a US$45million tier four data centre.
Furthermore, he reiterated that this strategic investment and its management will assist government to realise its digitalisation goals as it continues building new systems to change the old ways of doing things.
The Onix Data Centre is a private facility owned by African Infrastructure Investment Managers (AIIM), founded by two market giants, Macquarie from Australia and Old Mutual from South Africa.
The Tier IV certification means that Onix will satisfy the increasingly stringent requirements laid down by regulated entities such as banks, healthcare providers, and certain arms of government that manage sensitive information.
Chief Executive Officer of Onix, Michael Nahon, stated that Ghana’s drive toward a digital future is supported by Onix, and is optimistic that this facility will attract hyper-scale corporates to Ghana as the tiering meets international standards.
“This is a big moment for Ghana and the entire region, and we are excited to offer this kind of service in Ghana that meets and exceeds worldwide corporate requirements as the certification is internationally accepted.
As a Tier IV enterprise-class facility, which is the highest level for a data centre, Onix will offer stable, reliable and uninterrupted service with an annual expected uptime of 99.9 percent to enhance the security of data. The data centre has 2.5 times the amount of required backup when maintenance, or planned or unplanned disruptions occur,” he said.
He added that outsourcing the responsibility of running a data centre removes the managerial responsibility, and enables the industry to focus on its core business and strategy. Hence, using Onix – an external data centre facility, will enable industries to prepare for growth with worldwide trends showing an increasing reliance on data.
The South African High Commissioner to Ghana, Grace Mason, in her remarks, indicated that this digital infrastructure investment and innovative technology will guarantee services availability, operational sustainability, completely fault-tolerant, progressive data protection, and is also environmentally safe.
