Africa’s lack of infrastructure is not a hindrance to first-world technology adoption on the continent.

This is according to Tony Reid, the chief operating officer for emerging EMEA at Hitachi Data Systems.

Reid made the comments at a Hitachi Data Systems event in Kenya where the company launched its continuous cloud infrastructure in Kenya.

“Problems that business have here in East Africa and Africa are really no different to what we see in other businesses across the world. Here we see more innovation because of the potential infrastructure issues so we see more innovation that leapfrogs the problems in other markets,” Reid told ITWeb Africa.

“But the ability to bring something new to market for our customers is as important here as anywhere else. Our customers want to retain competitive edge and they need the IT infrastructure to support those things. A large bank here in Kenya has the same needs as a large bank in London or in New York,” Reid added.

Reid explained that his company has methods of working around limitations including network availability in Africa.

At the Hitachi launch, the company introduced its ‘Storage Virtualisation Operating System’ (SVOS), the Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform G1000.

The company also launched the next version of its Hitachi Command Suite management system.

“We have been in Africa for over 10 years. Over the last two years we have invested in our East African hub in Nairobi and West Africa hub in Lagos. That’s the foundation of the business. Then investment will continue,” Reid said.