2024 Cloud and Security Conference — Vodacom Business’ Kabelo Makwane on AI and digital transformation challenges

Kabelo Makwane, Vodacom Business’s Managing Executive for Cloud, Hosting, and Security, recently participated in a panel discussion at the 2024 MyBroadband Cloud and Security Conference.

Makwane boasts over 20 years of ICT industry experience and has held key leadership roles at companies such as Accenture, Microsoft, and Cisco during this time.

He has also fulfilled board responsibilities in the financial services sector as a non-executive director.

Makwane holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of KwaZulu-Natal and has an MBA from the University of the Witwatersrand.

He is passionate about people development, business development, making an impact, and technology’s role in societal progress.

Panel discussion

Makwane began the panel discussion by acknowledging that the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated business transformation.

However, companies now face a new issue — they are not maximising the digital solutions they have paid for.

“These companies are in the cloud, but they’re not leveraging the full benefits of the cloud,” said Makwane.

He explained that Vodacom Business is focused on helping these companies get the full value of the cloud solutions they are paying for.

SMEs

Makwane then discussed that SMEs tend to be more open to embracing the cloud.

“This is down to the types of cloud solutions they’re adopting, which are usually as-a-service solutions,” said Makwane.

“If I’m a smaller business, I’m looking for technologies that simplify my operations, as I do not have the luxury of hiring expensive cloud experts to run my own cloud solutions,” said Makwane.

Furthermore, these solutions are more cost-effective, which is often the deciding factor for SMBs.

As a result of these different factors, SMBs are willing to let experts manage their services on their behalf.

This often translates to these companies being more cloud-native than large enterprises with dedicated IT teams.

AI

Makwane also discussed AI, noting that the technology is having a massive positive effect on Vodacom Business’s operations.

“From a database perspective, we have hundreds of millions of customers, and are effectively the largest fintech company in Africa,” said Makwane.

“If we were to go down, governments and their financial systems would shut down.”

Vodacom is therefore embracing AI to help it protect its valuable customer data through solutions focused on data security and access management, while leveraging AI insights to ensure it delivers exceptional uptime.

Click here to learn more about Vodacom Business’s cloud and security solutions.