Cellulant Creates Cloud Experience for Data, Cloud Sovereignty . relatedposts. glance launches ai-native shopping app backed by google. may 22, 2025 lagos tops global list of fastest-growing tech ecosystems in 2025. may 22, 2025 pan-african financial technology company providing locally relevant and alternative payment methods for global, regional and local merchants, cellulant has created a contiguous cloud experience that enables it to meet data and cloud sovereignty requirements across its regions. working with pure infrastructure, a vmware cloud provider, cellulant can now offer its services across borders and deliver a ubiquitous user experience, in addition to hosting specific applications in a public cloud while ensuring its transactional data is hosted on its vmware cloud in the country of origin. no regulator across africa is the same. to deliver a pan-african service, companies must meet each country’s regulations relating to data residency, compliance, and data sovereignty. this is especially relevant to financial services organisations that deal with the most sensitive data, and for whom the public cloud is not an option, especially since few of these companies offer in-country data centres and are unable to fulfil data sovereignty requirements. “our vision is to make payments frictionless and seamless, no matter where they are being made. if we can’t meet this core fundamental requirement, we don’t have a business, nor do the merchants and banks we work with. we are on a journey to solve the fragmented payment ecosystem in africa, providing solutions that address the challenges that merchants and banks face when it comes to collecting payments. by doing so, we believe that create opportunities that accelerate economic empowerment for all africans,” says john mburu, head of platform engineering at cellulant. advertisements the financial technology company, with offices in 18 countries serving 33 other african regions, initially planned to migrate its platform onto a public cloud for all its countries of operation, but due to varying data regulations across some markets, this was not feasible – as some regulatory bodies require that payment data be hosted in-country and meet local data sovereignty requirements. to navigate this challenge, cellulant partnered with vmware cloud provider pure infrastructure, leveraging its vmware cloud infrastructure to create a private cloud to host payment data and applications in. this repeatable, autonomous, vendor-agnostic cloud model allows it to scale across borders without building a physical data centre in each country and provides a consistent developer experience. “we can scale and roll out services much faster, making it easier for us to get services up and running without waiting for annual budget cycles. the first benefit we saw was how quickly the products became available. within a couple of weeks of closing discussions with pure infrastructure, we got our licenses and could select the services we wanted to start with and which ones to add later,” says mburu. “to make our technology align with the way the business works, we needed to embrace a utility model so we could grow and shrink infrastructure as needed. it’s been invaluable for us to move to an opex model, allowing us to model our business and revenue models down to a transaction and per use,” says mburu. “building a repeatable cloud model that it can lift and replicate in any country is ingenious. this innovation highlights exactly how cellulant is reshaping the african payment space. they have not only proved the flexibility of the cloud, but with their partner, pure infrastructure, they have proven the cost efficiencies a company can gain from their cloud when they get the recipe right,” says sumeeth singh, cloud provider business head, sub-saharan africa, vmware. author. joan aimuengheuwa joan thrives at helping individuals and businesses scale via storytelling. view all posts. 0shares tags: cellulant john mburu sumeeth singh
Pan-African financial technology company providing locally relevant and alternative payment methods for global, regional and local merchants, Cellulant has created a contiguous cloud experience that enables it to meet data and cloud sovereignty requirements across its regions.
Working with Pure Infrastructure, a VMware Cloud Provider, Cellulant can now offer its services across borders and deliver a ubiquitous user experience, in addition to hosting specific applications in a public cloud while ensuring its transactional data is hosted on its VMware Cloud in the country of origin.
No regulator across Africa is the same.
To deliver a Pan-African service, companies must meet each country’s regulations relating to data residency, compliance, and data sovereignty. This is especially relevant to financial services organisations that deal with the most sensitive data, and for whom the public cloud is not an option, especially since few of these companies offer in-country data centres and are unable to fulfil data sovereignty requirements.
“Our vision is to make payments frictionless and seamless, no matter where they are being made. If we can’t meet this core fundamental requirement, we don’t have a business, nor do the merchants and banks we work with. We are on a journey to solve the fragmented payment ecosystem in Africa, providing solutions that address the challenges that merchants and banks face when it comes to collecting payments. By doing so, we believe that create opportunities that accelerate economic empowerment for all Africans,” says John Mburu, Head of Platform Engineering at Cellulant.
Advertisements
Cellulant
The financial technology company, with offices in 18 countries serving 33 other African regions, initially planned to migrate its platform onto a public cloud for all its countries of operation, but due to varying data regulations across some markets, this was not feasible – as some regulatory bodies require that payment data be hosted in-country and meet local data sovereignty requirements.
To navigate this challenge, Cellulant partnered with VMware Cloud Provider Pure Infrastructure, leveraging its VMware Cloud infrastructure to create a private cloud to host payment data and applications in. This repeatable, autonomous, vendor-agnostic cloud model allows it to scale across borders without building a physical data centre in each country and provides a consistent developer experience.
“We can scale and roll out services much faster, making it easier for us to get services up and running without waiting for annual budget cycles. The first benefit we saw was how quickly the products became available. Within a couple of weeks of closing discussions with Pure Infrastructure, we got our licenses and could select the services we wanted to start with and which ones to add later,” says Mburu.
“To make our technology align with the way the business works, we needed to embrace a utility model so we could grow and shrink infrastructure as needed. It’s been invaluable for us to move to an OPEX model, allowing us to model our business and revenue models down to a transaction and per use,” says Mburu.
“Building a repeatable cloud model that it can lift and replicate in any country is ingenious. This innovation highlights exactly how Cellulant is reshaping the African payment space. They have not only proved the flexibility of the cloud, but with their partner, Pure Infrastructure, they have proven the cost efficiencies a company can gain from their cloud when they get the recipe right,” says Sumeeth Singh, Cloud Provider business head, Sub-Saharan Africa, VMware.
Infowave is brought to you by TechEconomy. Every week we will bring new stories from startups and influencers who are shaping and changing the world we live in. We’ll also bring you reports on topics you should know.
This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this website you are giving consent to cookies being used. Visit our Privacy and Cookie Policy.
Press play to listen to this content
Cellulant Creates Cloud Experience for Data, Cloud Sovereignty . relatedposts. glance launches ai-native shopping app backed by google. may 22, 2025 lagos tops global list of fastest-growing tech ecosystems in 2025. may 22, 2025 pan-african financial technology company providing locally relevant and alternative payment methods for global, regional and local merchants, cellulant has created a contiguous cloud experience that enables it to meet data and cloud sovereignty requirements across its regions. working with pure infrastructure, a vmware cloud provider, cellulant can now offer its services across borders and deliver a ubiquitous user experience, in addition to hosting specific applications in a public cloud while ensuring its transactional data is hosted on its vmware cloud in the country of origin. no regulator across africa is the same. to deliver a pan-african service, companies must meet each country’s regulations relating to data residency, compliance, and data sovereignty. this is especially relevant to financial services organisations that deal with the most sensitive data, and for whom the public cloud is not an option, especially since few of these companies offer in-country data centres and are unable to fulfil data sovereignty requirements. “our vision is to make payments frictionless and seamless, no matter where they are being made. if we can’t meet this core fundamental requirement, we don’t have a business, nor do the merchants and banks we work with. we are on a journey to solve the fragmented payment ecosystem in africa, providing solutions that address the challenges that merchants and banks face when it comes to collecting payments. by doing so, we believe that create opportunities that accelerate economic empowerment for all africans,” says john mburu, head of platform engineering at cellulant. advertisements the financial technology company, with offices in 18 countries serving 33 other african regions, initially planned to migrate its platform onto a public cloud for all its countries of operation, but due to varying data regulations across some markets, this was not feasible – as some regulatory bodies require that payment data be hosted in-country and meet local data sovereignty requirements. to navigate this challenge, cellulant partnered with vmware cloud provider pure infrastructure, leveraging its vmware cloud infrastructure to create a private cloud to host payment data and applications in. this repeatable, autonomous, vendor-agnostic cloud model allows it to scale across borders without building a physical data centre in each country and provides a consistent developer experience. “we can scale and roll out services much faster, making it easier for us to get services up and running without waiting for annual budget cycles. the first benefit we saw was how quickly the products became available. within a couple of weeks of closing discussions with pure infrastructure, we got our licenses and could select the services we wanted to start with and which ones to add later,” says mburu. “to make our technology align with the way the business works, we needed to embrace a utility model so we could grow and shrink infrastructure as needed. it’s been invaluable for us to move to an opex model, allowing us to model our business and revenue models down to a transaction and per use,” says mburu. “building a repeatable cloud model that it can lift and replicate in any country is ingenious. this innovation highlights exactly how cellulant is reshaping the african payment space. they have not only proved the flexibility of the cloud, but with their partner, pure infrastructure, they have proven the cost efficiencies a company can gain from their cloud when they get the recipe right,” says sumeeth singh, cloud provider business head, sub-saharan africa, vmware. author. joan aimuengheuwa joan thrives at helping individuals and businesses scale via storytelling. view all posts. 0shares tags: cellulant john mburu sumeeth singh
