A handful of Nigerian cloud providers are currently lobbying the government to be the hosts for sensitive government data.
This move by these companies follows the 2019 National Cloud Computing Policy, which states that local cloud service providers should be the first choice consideration.
If the proposal to use local cloud services is approved, it will encourage more businesses and organizations in Nigeria to switch to these local options, especially with the decreasing value of Naira.
These local cloud service providers are willing to offer discounts to companies ready to host their data locally as they position themselves for a thriving data center market with a 2029 projection of up to $578.1 million.
According to a report, some government agencies spend around $500,000 monthly hosting their data on cloud services like AWS and Microsoft Azure.
Looking at the larger scale, the move for local patronage is not just a cheaper alternative than the foreign counterparts which charge in dollars but also a way to enable Nigeria to reduce its forex burdens.
These efforts by the cloud providers are in sync with the growing investments in data centers in Nigeria because of the demand for data storage solutions following the arrival of eight sub-sea cables.
In Lagos, Airtel is building a hyper-scale data center. Another is a $250 million Tier IV data center by Kasi Cloud Limited, which has been under construction since 2022. MTN Nigeria is said to be on the verge of completing its second data center by December 2024.