Telkom subsidiary BCX has teamed up with Alibaba to bring Alibaba Cloud to Mozambique.
The Africa Local Public (ALP) Cloud services are hosted in a BCX data center in Maputo.
By expanding this to Mozambique, Alibaba hopes to enhance local capabilities with low latency and high-efficiency cloud services.
BCX CEO Jonas Bogoshi said: “The collaboration between Alibaba Cloud and BCX allows us to bring the latest technologies through a local company that understands the complexities for businesses operating on our continent.
“BCX sets itself apart from competitors by giving priority to a local approach. Recognizing the paramount importance of data sovereignty for Mozambican businesses, BCX has installed its latest ALP Cloud in Maputo.”
Jan Bouwer, chief solutions officer of BCX, added: “We are committed to keeping local data within Africa’s borders. The ALP Cloud not only ensures data remains within Mozambique, addressing data sovereignty and compliance requirements, but also offers redundancy through neighboring availability zones and on-the-ground local support for customers.”
The ALP Cloud services are billed in local currency which prevents issues caused by a potentially unpredictable exchange rate.
This is the second African country that Alibaba has launched its Africa Local Public Cloud services, having launched in South Africa in October 2023.
The Chinese company hosts its South African cloud services in two data centers, creating two Johannesburg availability zones: BCX’s Midrand-based data center and Teraco Data Environment’s Isando-based data center.
The next phase of the ALP Cloud rollout will see a zone set up in a Cape Town data center.
Also offering cloud services in South Africa are Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, and Google.
BCX, a subsidiary within Telkom Group, is one of Africa's largest systems integrators. Founded as Business Connexion in 1996, Telkom acquired the company in 2015.
The company announced a partnership with Alibaba in October 2022 granting the company exclusive rights and authority to distribute Alibaba Cloud’s products and services in South Africa.
Alibaba currently operates 89 availability zones in 30 regions globally. The company's cloud unit has had a dramatic year.
In May 2023 the company revealed it was planning to spin off the cloud unit, known as Aliyun, and in September the company was considering a $3bn private funding raise for the plan.
However, by November 2023, the plan was dropped due to the US export bans on advanced chips limiting Chinese cloud companies' offering potential. The sudden U-turn led to a 10 percent drop in Alibaba's shares.
Since then, in an effort to be more competitive, the company slashed its cloud computing costs. First in China by as much as 55 percent as announced in March 2024, and a month later this was extended to international customers.
