A big change is coming to Africa’s tech world. A new cloud partnership is starting. It aims to bring the first “neutral multi-tenant AI factory” to the continent. This will help improve AI across Africa.

This AI factory will change Africa’s economy and tech. It will give cloud providers in Africa, like in Nigeria, a chance to grow. They can become more competitive.

This move is a big step for Africa’s tech growth. It opens up new chances for innovation. As Africa goes digital, projects like this are key to its future.

The Launch of Africa’s First Multi-Tenant AI Factory

What is the “AI Factory”?

• “AI Factory” refers to a data-centre facility equipped with high-performance computing infrastructure (GPUs, software, cooling, fibre-optic connectivity) that supports training, fine-tuning, and serving advanced AI models.

• These facilities allow companies, researchers, startups, and even governments to access enterprise-grade AI compute without building their own expensive hardware infrastructure.

Who’s building it – and when?

• Cassava Technologies, led by business magnate Strive Masiyiwa, has partnered with NVIDIA to build what they call Africa’s first AI Factory.

• The first facility is planned for deployment in South Africa, with operations expected to begin by June 2025.

• Further expansion is planned to other data-centre facilities across Africa — including Nigeria, as well as Egypt, Kenya and Morocco.

What the AI Factory promises to deliver

• AI as a Service (AIaaS): Cassava says the facility will deliver AI infrastructure and computing power over its pan-African fibre-optic network – allowing companies, researchers and governments to build, train, and deploy AI solutions locally.

• Data sovereignty & local hosting: By hosting AI compute within Africa, the factory aims to keep sensitive data on the continent — addressing concerns about data export, latency, compliance, and regional control.

• Boost to innovation, startups & AI adoption: The infrastructure lowers the barrier of entry for African startups, researchers and enterprises to access world-class compute — enabling them to build AI products tailored to African contexts rather than relying on overseas cloud services.

Why It Matters – Especially for Nigeria and African Tech

• Bridging Africa’s AI infrastructure gap: Historically, much of AI infrastructure (GPUs, supercomputing) has been concentrated in North America, Europe or Asia. Having a locally hosted AI Factory brings compute closer to African data, reducing latency, costs, and reliance on foreign infrastructure.

• Empowering local startups, researchers, and businesses: With accessible compute power, more African innovators can experiment, build and deploy AI without prohibitive costs – fostering a homegrown AI ecosystem.

• Supporting data sovereignty and privacy: Hosting data and compute locally helps address legal, regulatory, and trust issues around data export and cross-border data flows – important in sectors such as finance, health, and governance.

• Boost to digital economy, job creation, and technological independence: Over time, this infrastructure can catalyse a wave of AI-based products and services in Africa — in agriculture, health, education, fintech, and entertainment – thus contributing to economic growth and skills development.

• Accessibility for Nigeria: Because Cassava lists Nigeria among planned expansion countries, Nigerian businesses, developers, or researchers interested in AI may gain access to this infrastructure, reducing the cost/time required to launch AI projects.

 Key Challenges & What to Watch Out For

This project, while promising, also raises important issues that stakeholders (governments, companies, civil society) must carefully manage:

• Timeline — “planned expansion,” not yet live: As of now, only the South Africa facility is confirmed to go live by mid-2025. Facilities in other countries (including Nigeria) are still in the development/planning phase.

• Data security and governance: Hosting sensitive data requires strong regulatory frameworks to ensure privacy, compliance, and protection against misuse. African governments may need to strengthen data-protection laws, AI governance policies, and oversight mechanisms.

• Accessibility & affordability: Even with infrastructure in place, the cost of using the factory (subscriptions, compute hours, bandwidth, etc.) must remain affordable for smaller African startups, SMEs, and researchers —not just large firms.

• Infrastructure readiness: AI compute requires a stable power supply, reliable fibre-optic internet, and low-latency networks – some African regions (including parts of Nigeria) still face infrastructure challenges.

• Capacity building & human talent shortage: Having hardware is not enough — local developers, engineers, and data scientists need training and capacity to build, deploy and maintain AI systems effectively.

• Ethical and social risks: As AI adoption grows, risks related to bias, misuse, privacy breaches, the digital divide, and equitable access must be proactively addressed.

What Needs to Be Done

To maximise benefit and minimise risks, stakeholders – governments, the private sector, and research institutions – should:

1. Strengthen data-protection and AI governance frameworks: Enact/implement laws and policies that ensure data privacy, consent, accountability, and transparency for AI systems.

2. Promote inclusive, affordable access: Offer subsidised/tiered access to compute resources for startups, researchers, NGOs, academia – ensure small players benefit too.

3. Invest in infrastructure development: Improve power reliability, internet backbone expansion, and fibre-optic connectivity – especially outside major metros.

4. Support capacity building and skills development: Launch AI training programmes, partnerships with universities, and bootcamps to train local talent in AI engineering and operations.

5. Encourage local AI innovation: Use the AI Factory to develop solutions for African-specific problems-agriculture, healthcare, education, climate-not just import global AI models.

6. Establish transparent oversight and ethical guidelines: Commit to fairness, accountability, bias-checking, security standards – especially as AI systems handle sensitive or personal data.

The launch of Africa’s first multi-tenant AI Factory by Cassava Technologies and NVIDIA marks a landmark moment for the continent’s digital and AI future. For Nigeria, and Africa broadly, it could signal the beginning of a new era – one where AI development doesn’t require outsourcing to overseas cloud providers, but happens right at home.

If appropriately implemented, this infrastructure can democratise access to AI, fuel innovation, and help Africans build AI solutions tailored to local needs. But success depends on sound policy, inclusive access, infrastructure readiness, and responsible use.

As this initiative rolls out, stakeholders across Africa – governments, businesses, educators, developers – should prepare to engage, build skills, and shape this new AI era to benefit the many, not just the few.