Platform Africa 2023 | PLATFORM MARKET GROUP | 21 June 2023 | Le Palace, Es Saadi Marrakech Resort, Avenue Quadissia Marrakech 40000

Africa’s growing importance coincides with a global influx of capital to build digital infrastructure. Yet the continent’s infrastructure remains massively under-invested with reportedly less than 1 per cent of global data center supply, outdated power systems, and scant terrestrial fiber.

South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya and Egypt stand out as more advanced in terms of data center infrastructure development but fiber, dark fiber, new subsea cable systems and cable landing stations around the continent are driving new markets and opportunities.

Hyperscale is at a very early stage across the continent, but industry reports suggest that future demand will be driven by small and medium-sized enterprises, government agencies, data privacy laws, increased mobile deployment, use of fintech, video and gaming. Digital Africa is beginning to emerge, with an estimated 70% of African organizations estimated to move to the cloud by 2025.

Africa represents potentially the largest investment opportunity for data centers and Edge in the near term.
Over the past two years digital demand in Africa has accelerated through ecommerce, mobile, video, gaming, fintech and data residency legislation among other local drivers as well as the general intensity of increased demand generated across the pandemic.

New infrastructure developments are taking place simultaneously across the African continent.

New cloud regions are in the process of being deployed by global infrastructure providers, hyperscale is emerging, along with significant investment in subsea cable and landing stations connected to new and planned facilities and the opening up of new economies.

Looking forward, changes in energy and digitization will introduce new dynamics to existing infrastructure and this event will explore both the challenges and tremendous investment and growth opportunities emerging across the continent.

2023 Speakers

Wale Ajisebutu
Chairman/CEO, 21st Century Technologies (Nigeria)

Akin Akin-Taylor
Investment Principal, AIIMAfrica

Stephen Beard
Global Head of Data Centres, Knight Frank

Amine Benchekroun
Vice President IT Division - FSA & Islands, Schneider Electric International

Mahmoud Bennani
Senior Associate, Africa50 Infrastructure Acceleration Fund

Sebastien Bonneau
Partner, Eversheds Sutherland

Fabiola Bordino
Head of Sustainability, Marketing & Communication, Start Campus

Thierry Chamayou
Vice President, Schneider Electric

Gary Chomse
Strategic Segments Director Africa, Vertiv

Ayotunde Coker
CEO, Open Access Data Centres

Ivan Cornet
Managing Partner, Real Estate, Infrastructure & Private Equity, Latitude Five

Ange Kacou Diagou
Group Chief Executive, New Digital Africa

Stephane Duproz
Group Executive Director, SVP, Cassava Technologies

Mouna Essa-Egh
VP Middle East and Africa, IT Division, Schneider Electric

Charlie Evans
Vice President, Guggenheim Securities LLC

Safia Fassi Fihri
Associate Counsel, Corporate Commercial, Al Tamimi & Co

Stefan Frenzel
Managing Director DME, OCP Lead Regional Project Community - Europe

Rudolf Gordon-Seymour
EMEA Director, Infrastructure Masons

David Gyulnazaryan
Project Lead / Independent Consultant, OCP / Impleon

Nicola Hayes
Associate Dean, LSBU & NED Platform Markets Group

Magloire Hiol
Managing Director, PAIX Data Centres, Cote D'Ivoire

Obinna Isiadinso
Global Sector Lead Data Centers and Cloud Services, International Finance Corporation (IFC)

Amine Kandil
CEO & Founder, N+ONE DATACENTERS

Naceur Kchaou
General Manager, DataXion

Jasper Lankhorst
Chief Executive Officer, Actis-Convergence Partners, pan-African data centre platform

Bernard Lecanu
President, BL International

Nicholas Lodge
Director and Chief Strategist, wingu.africa

Loren Long
Managing Director, SLEdge Consulting

Mustapha Louni
Senior Vice President - IMEA & SAPAC Regions, Uptime Institute

Nash Maharaj
Senior Solutions Architect, Vertiv EMEA

Nnamdi Moses
Senior Business Development & Operations Manager – Africa, KuCoin Exchange

Abderrahmane Mounir
CEO, Orunix Digital (Helios Investment Partners Portfolio Company)

Michael Nahon
CEO, Onix Data Centers

Yaw Owusu
Managing Director, Gateway Innovations

Ronald Philip
Senior Director, Agility Data Center Campuses

Conor Plant
Partner, HTL

Alex Rabbetts
CEO, Corozon Business Concierge

Milan Radia
Senior Vice President, DAMAC Data Centers

Muhammed Rudman
Managing Director/CEO, IXPN

Alban Hohmann Schauly
AME Data Center Manager - Electric Power, Caterpillar

Kyle Spencer
Chairman and Executive Director, Uganda Internet Exchange Point

Patrice Tano
Director General, Databridge

Yann Tanvez
Senior Investment Officer - Infrastructure Africa, International Finance Corporation, World Bank Group

Anthony Voscarides
CEO, wingu.africa

Faith Waithaka
Cloud and Services Provider Segment Sales Lead, Schneider Electric

Mourad Younes
Cloud & Services Segment Leader MEA Region, Schneider Electric

Moundir Zniber
President, Gaia Energy

2023 Partners

Founding Partner:
• Schneider Electric

Lead Silver Partners:
• Uptime Institute
• Caterpillar
• Vertiv

Silver Partner:
• N+ONE

Industry Partner:
• PAIX

Strategic Partners:
• Africa Data Centres Association
• Africa Internet Exchange Association
• Cirkla
• France Datacenter
• German Data Center Association
• Gulf Data Centre Association
• Grass Consulting