JUBA, May 28 (Xinhua) -- South Sudan on Tuesday launched a state-of-the-art data center in the capital, Juba, as the young nation moves to improve data protection and management and support mobile money transactions.
Lado Wani Kenyi, director-general of National Communication Authority (NCA), said the center will help the east African nation recover from five years of conflict and achieve self-sufficiency in data protection and management.
"The launch of the next-generation data center will enable South Sudan to establish self-sufficiency in cutting edge technology built to ISO (International Standard Organization) specification hardware, software and cyber security features including firewalls and physical security," Kenyi said.
The data center, set up by Trinity Technologies, a local company based in South Sudan, will also offer colocation services to businesses, government and non-governmental organizations to rent space for servers and other computing hardware.
Justine Alier, undersecretary at the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, said the center will enhance improved environment for business to spur economic recovery.
"The launch of this world-class data center is testament to the immense confidence exhibited by the business community in the country, taking advantage of the stability of the economy and its prospects to deploy cutting edge technological solutions in the development of the country," Alier said.
The data center will enable hosting of critical IT solutions in South Sudan instead of in foreign countries.
Richard Raja, director of Trinity Technologies, said the data center is managed by a team of well-trained South Sudanese professionals.
"Trinity Technology will continue to benchmark against the industry best practices, invest in research and product development to ensure innovative new products delivery to the people of South Sudan," he said.
In November last year, South Sudan granted license to Trinity Technologies to start mobile money and electronic cash transfer in a bid to widen financial inclusion targeting millions of impoverished people without access to financial services.
The company will partner with such telecoms companies as MTN and Zain to roll out mobile money operations.
The center, now a tier-two colocation data center, has a roadmap toward achieving tier-three data center verification approvals by the fourth quarter of 2019.
Its services include a mobile money platform, M-Gurush, and national payment systems, agency and mobile banking, and other digital and payment solutions.
