Hybrid Multi-Cloud: The Future of Scalable Business

Afolabi Ademola Ilesanmi

Head of Architect and Governance, Access Bank

Access Bank, a multinational commercial bank headquartered in Lagos, Nigeria, operates in 17 countries, has $25.5 billion in assets, and employs 28,000 staff. With products and business units in commercial, business, and retail banking, our ultimate goal is to transform our business model from being reliant on a physical presence and interaction, to being largely driven by technology platforms which are enhanced by physical distribution and interaction.

At Access Bank, we are committed to using the latest technologies and solutions to meet the ever-evolving needs of our customers and stay ahead of the competition. The underlying foundation of technology is infrastructure. Businesses need to have all of their infrastructure working together before they can scale. One of the solutions that we have found success in is from making use of hybrid multi-cloud.

The hybrid multi-cloud model is a type of cloud computing environment that combines multiple public and private clouds to provide a single, cohesive infrastructure. It helps businesses optimize their IT infrastructure, improve the security of their data, and increase their flexibility and scalability. In the past, businesses would have needed to add new servers and devices to their on-premises infrastructure in order to keep up with business growth, but that is no longer the case. Infrastructure has completely transformed from what it used to be. Nowadays, businesses can scale without fear, as infrastructure is offered as a service.

One of the most exciting aspects of Huawei's latest MEGA digital infrastructure solutions for financial services is its autonomous capabilities. By leveraging Artificial Intelligence, automation, and machine learning, businesses can focus more on strategy and innovation. These technologies often do the job better than humans, as they see things and fix them faster and can even predict when things will go wrong. Adding autonomous capabilities to your business operations is the way forward, as everything can now be automated, from your applications and services, to infrastructure and databases.

The benefits of using hybrid multi-cloud solutions in digital transformation are vast. By partnering with experienced providers and investing in employee training and support, businesses can successfully navigate the challenges of migration to hybrid multi-cloud solutions and unlock the full potential of these solutions. In studying how other companies' have used hybrid cloud solutions, we can also learn how to adapt it to our own use case and further drive our own business.

As we look towards the future, it is clear that data is key to digital transformation, and businesses must understand both structured and unstructured data to grow. Data insights are vital to transforming the customer experience and the business. Security has also always been a top priority for us, so it is something that we will continue prioritizing.

To further our data transformation journey, we plan to build a data factory and a data lake that can provide us with the level of insights we need. Having data on hand is not enough, as true power lies in the insights that can be extracted from that data. Leveraging cloud services to achieve this goal is necessary, as not being able to do this on-premises has been a pain point for us.

By further investing in hybrid multi-cloud solutions, we are confident that we can successfully navigate our digital transition and unlock the full potential of data and cloud solutions. At Access Bank, we are committed to leveraging hybrid multi-cloud solutions to drive our business forward. We believe that hybrid multi-cloud is transforming the way businesses build out their capabilities and helping businesses offer their customers what they want.

We are excited to be at the forefront of this transformation and to use technologies like advanced analytics, cloud computing, AI, machine learning and robotics process automation to re-shape business operations and to emerge as the clear-cut digital leader in Africa.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy, position, products, and technologies of Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. If you need to learn more about the products and technologies of Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., please visit our website at e.huawei.com or contact us.