BCN Partners Zadara, Touchnet to Launch Africa’s Neutral Multi-tenant AI Cloud

Emma Okonji

Backbone Connectivity Network (BCN), a Unified Communication Service Provider and Zadara, the sovereign AI cloud leader, announced a partnership deal at the AfricaCom 2025 conference that would enable them launch Africa’s firdt multi-tenant AI cloud in Nigeria.

Through the collaboration, BCN will launch a Zadara-powered multi-tenant Neutral AI cloud in Nigeria, empowering cloud providers across Africa to modernise their offerings by enabling provisioning of AI clouds that are high-performance, cost- effective, and resilient.

Many cloud providers across Africa are experiencing growing demand for AI services. However, most struggle to afford the large-scale infrastructure investments required to build competitive AI clouds without upfront customer commitments, while customers, in turn, are reluctant to commit before such

AI clouds are operational.

To address the challenge, BCN is launching a Neutral AI Cloud powered by Zadara’s multi-tenant platform. Zadara is one of the first NVIDIA design and integration partners to enable multi-tenancy for high performance scalable NVIDIA AI factories by adhering to NVIDIA reference architecture for multi-tenant AI clouds.

Zadara’s multi-tenancy empowers BCN to provision AI clouds for cloud providers starting from a compact form factor with seamless scalability. The flexible model allows cloud providers to efficiently deploy AI clouds of any size, fulfilling growing AI demand without making significant upfront capital investments.

BCN has long been recognized for its exceptional service and commitment to customer success. With operations spanning Nigeria and beyond supported by a wholly owned fiber infrastructure, a license from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), and access to cost-efficient energy resources, BCN is uniquely positioned to launch Africa’s first Neutral Multi-Tenant AI Cloud.

CEO of BCN, Ibrahim Dikko, in a statement, said: “Our partnership with Zadara enables us to deliver Africa’s first Neutral AI Cloud. Cloud providers across Africa need a trusted partner to supply the AI cloud infrastructure that powers their services. BCN requires multi-tenant AI cloud software capable of provisioning secure, cost-effective, and business-specific AI clouds from our Neutral AI Cloud. Together with Zadara, we are making that vision a reality.”

CEO of Zadara, Yoram Novick, said: “We’re excited to partner with BCN to launch Africa’s first Neutral Multi-Tenant AI Cloud. Together, we’re combining BCN’s Neutral Cloud, Zadara’s advanced multi-tenancy software, and NVIDIA’s industry-leading AI platform to help cloud providers across the continent to accelerate their transformation into the AI era. This collaboration delivers scalable, secure, and cost-efficient AI that foster innovation and drive digital growth throughout Africa.”