Gateway Business launches knowledge forum on Sharing Business Ideas with Leading Business Executives in Nigeria.

Gateway Business, one of the largest pan-African communications network with customers in 40 countries, today hosted their first knowledge breakfast forum. The intimate event, entitled “Cloud Computing and the African Business”, was aimed at providing business leaders with informative perspectives on cloud computing and its positive impact on business in Africa.

Cloud Computing is in the simplest terms, IT-as-a-Service. It is a model for enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, servers, storage, applications, and services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. “According to Gartner, by 2012, 80% of Fortune 1000 enterprises will be using some cloud computing services, 20% of businesses will own no IT assets.”

Gateway Business, and business executives from Exxon Mobil, Union Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, Access Bank, Nigerian Breweries, Ecobank and Chevron to name a few, discussed available cloud solutions and highlighted the main benefits as: unified collaboration, business innovation, enterprise agility, business efficiency, and unified scalability across PCs, phones and browsers.

Louis Pienaar (Product Manager Cloud Solutions) said

“We have combined our years of experience and track record in delivering both traditional and utility-based services with the best of the newest Cloud approaches. We can help you decide which services are for you - whether your own, from us or from the external global Cloud - and combine them together to deliver what you need without undermining the security and integrity of your business. These services can be adopted in an evolutionary manner, with no capital investments or long-term commitments to see the business results”

Commenting on the event, Guy Clarke (MD, Gateway Business Nigeria) said:

“Today, we have discussed the various cloud platforms available and addressed concerns about security, compliance and service levels. We are fully committed to our business in Nigeria and across Africa and will continue to grow and build our network infrastructure and the development of value added services to better maintain our relevance and ensure we add value to our customers and the markets we service. ”.

The event is the beginning of a series of knowledge forums led by Gateway Business that will bring together businesses to discuss important issues affecting the way businesses operate today and provide insight on competitive ways to operate in the current business economic climate.