By James Ratemo
Kenya’s stature in the region is set for a boost after a plan to build a state-of-the-art eco-friendly data centre which will serve East and Central Africa by end of next year was unveiled. The centre will relieve the region from having to seek back-up services in Europe and America.
Breaking ground for the Sh600milliion centre by Kenya Data Networks (KDN), Prime Minister, Raila Odinga, said the Government was keen on making Kenya a green economy by 2020.
Powered by solar energy, the data centre, which will be housed at Sameer Businesss Park, shall serve Kenya, and other African countries willing to safeguard essential data under a world class, secure environment.
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Technology employed in building the centre will ensure the structure can withstand even a bomb attack. The centre will be classified at security level seven, which is the highest in the world; similar to that used by United Nations and top intelligence agencies across the world to secure data.
"Adopting technology is a must for countries that want to prosper," said Raila.
"The data centre will cut gas emissions and energy use through an improved architectural design which will use the latest solar-power technology to provide the energy requirements of the facility," said KDN Board Chairman, Naushad Merali.
KDN’s CEO, Kai Wolf, said the data centre is designed for disaster recovery, host mission-critical computer systems with fully redundant systems, and compartmentalised security zones.
Many companies spend between two to four per cent of their budget on disaster recovery planning. Completion of the data storage facility will therefore save the companies from losses and damage resulting from interruptions of their infrastructure and data.
