The Talent Blindspot in Africa’s Data Centre Boom
As billions pour into the continent’s digital infrastructure, industry leaders are working towards building the workforce to run it
LAGOS, NIGERIA — Data centre capacity across Africa is expanding at a pace unseen a decade ago. Hyperscalers, colocation providers, and telecom operators are announcing new builds and expansions across South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya and Egypt, driven by surging demand for cloud, AI, and digital financial services. But according to IBTC, a premier training organisation, and Rack Centre, West Africa’s leading AI & hyperscale-ready data centre operator, there’s a question the industry isn’t asking loudly enough: who is going to operate all of this?
“Every month there’s a new announcement — another facility, another investment, another megawatt of capacity coming online,” said Lars Johannisson, CEO of Rack Centre. “What gets far less attention is the workforce behind it. These are highly specialised facilities, and Africa’s data centre talent pipeline needs to scale at the same pace as its infrastructure. The good news is this is solvable, but it takes the same intentionality we’ve put into building capacity.”
The concern isn’t theoretical. Data centre operations require a narrow, technical skill set that traditional engineering or IT education doesn’t fully prepare graduates for, and unlike capacity, talent can’t be built in a single construction cycle.
“Africa is producing engineering graduates in enormous numbers — the talent is not the problem,” said Nikki Maritz, CEO of IBTC. “What’s missing is the bridge: the exposure to a live facility, and the certification that turns raw aptitude into someone an operator can trust with their infrastructure. Building that bridge is our role.”
Rack Centre, in partnership with IBTC, has taken steps to address the gap directly, and launched the Rack Centre Academy, a structured training programme combining globally recognised data centre certifications with hands-on operational experience. The Academy’s first cohort is progressing through industry certifications and moving into live facility placements, a model IBTC and Rack Centre hope other operators and industry bodies will replicate as the sector matures.
“We partnered with IBTC because the industry needed someone to move first — not because we had all the answers, but because this conversation couldn’t wait,” Johannisson said. “It’s encouraging to see other operators now announcing similar partnerships with IBTC — that’s exactly the shift we hoped to spark.”
“No single operator is going to solve this, and neither is one training provider,” Maritz said. “Rack Centre treated talent as something to build ahead of demand, not scramble for once the facility is switched on — that’s the shift the rest of the industry needs to make. Talent has to be funded and planned the same way the buildings are, or we’re all just competing for the same small pool of people.”
Rack Centre and IBTC are calling on industry peers, investors, and policymakers to prioritise workforce development alongside capacity expansion, as the region positions itself as a serious player in the global digital economy.
About Rack Centre
Rack Centre is West Africa’s leading AI & hyperscale-ready data centre. It operates a Tier III carrier & cloud neutral colocation and interconnection data centre campus in Lagos, Nigeria, powering the critical compute workloads of banks, telecom operators, cloud providers, and enterprises across the region.
About IBTC
IBTC is a trusted, accredited South African tuition provider offering globally recognised qualifications in finance, business and professional certifications since 2006. Its Data Centre Academy is the continent’s flagship workforce-development programme for the data centre industry, built on a “source, train, place” model and delivered with content and certification providers Schneider Electric University and EPI/EXIN. Rack Centre, in Lagos, was the Academy’s first operator partner.
Media Contact:
Rack Centre
Adebola Adefarati
Head of Marketing & Communications
Adebola.adefarati@rack-centre.com
+234 908 725 6833
IBTC
Karin Reissenauer
Programme Manager
+27 861 111 411
