Data sovereignty is, yet again, making headlines, this time with the news that technology company Cassava Technologies has agreed a strategic collaboration with global professional services company Accenture to scale Cassava’s sovereign AI capability across Africa.
Accenture says it will leverage its AI Refinery platform and other technologies to design and deliver sovereign AI solutions using Cassava’s GPU-as-a-Service (GPUaaS), housed in Cassava’s secure data centre facilities, accelerated with AI infrastructure from Nvidia, a leading name in AI computing. The solutions will enable Cassava’s existing and potential customers to process AI workloads and data within national borders in alignment with local requirements and regulations.
AI Refinery was created by Accenture and built with Nvidia AI Enterprise to help companies turn raw AI technology into useful business solutions.
Cassava will begin in South Africa and later expand into Egypt, Kenya, Morocco and Nigeria. This phased rollout is in line with Cassava’s expansions planned at its other data centre facilities across Africa.
Cassava will leverage the company’s pan-African high-speed, ultra-low-latency, fibre broadband network, which interconnects the company’s energy-efficient data centres to power AI computing workloads.
Through this collaboration, the two companies say they will integrate the context, languages, and cultural nuances of the region into these AI solutions, ensuring that the solutions and services are relevant and impactful for African enterprises across key sectors such as financial services, mining, telecommunications, agriculture and healthcare.
This localised approach, they say, will not only strengthen compliance and trust but also ensure that the technology reflects the realities of the markets it serves, enabling businesses to innovate in ways that are meaningful and sustainable.
Cassava says it will invest in the infrastructure and platform build-out to ensure readiness for commercialisation, with a focus on scalability, security and compliance, thereby reinforcing its broader commitment to responsible AI adoption, innovation and productivity growth in Africa.
