Olushola Okunlade Writes

Seplat Energy Plc (Seplat), a leading Nigerian independent energy company listed on both the Nigerian Exchange Limited and the London Stock Exchange, has emerged winner of the tensely coveted ‘Highest Net Asset Ratio’ award at The Pearl Award 2022.

The energy company was announced the winner by the organisers of the award at a ceremony held at Eko Hotel & Suite Victoria Island Lagos on Sunday night.

The return on net assets (RONA) ratio compares a firm’s net income with its assets and helps investors to determine how well the company is generating profit from its assets. The higher a firm’s earnings relative to its assets, the more effectively the company is deploying those assets.

The Board of Governors of the PEARL Awards Nigeria congratulated Seplat Energy Plc for emerging as the winner of the prestigious 2022 Highest Net Asset Ratio Award in the Market Excellence Awards Category for companies quoted on the Stock Market.

Commenting, the President, PEARL Awards, Mr. Tayo Orekoya, said the 2022 PEARL Awards with the theme: Sustaining Excellence Through Tenacity (SETT), reflects the current realities of the PEARL Awards,  Corporates and Capital Markets, locally and globally.

Orekoya said: “Over the years we have built and sustained a legacy through the PEARL Awards and this is attested to by the high reputation and credibility which corporate Nigeria and other stakeholders ascribe to the Awards Project for its impartiality and reliance on verifiable indices to determine the yearly winners.

The Chief Financial Officer, Seplat Energy, Mr. Emeka Onwuka, also commenting on the award, expressed appreciation of the Board, Management, and Staff of Seplat Energy Plc on the recognition, saying the feat remains a call for more work.

Onwuka said: “We thank the Board of Governors of the PEARL Awards Nigeria for this honour.

“At Seplat Energy Plc, our commitment to excellence and global best practices is unwavering. The Company had its sights set on the global business arena from its inception. Therefore, in April 2014 and in line with its vision of being a world-class energy company delivering premium value to all stakeholders, the company accomplished the historic feat of being the first Nigerian company to be listed on both the Nigerian Stock Exchange (now The Nigerian Exchange) and the main market of the London Stock Exchange – the world’s most respected international market for the admission and trading of equity, debt, and other securities.

“The main motive behind Seplat Energy’s vision of listing in two jurisdictions was the great desire to build a company that would stand the test of time and stands shoulder-to-shoulder with other global players from other climes. This award tonight reaffirms this, and for us, this is a call for more work.”

Jasper Lankhorst is the Group CEO of the Best-Connected Carrier And Cloud Neutral Data Centre In West Africa, Rack Centre

Rashidat Olushola Okunlade Writes

The Group Chief Executive Officer of the best-connected Tier III Carrier and Cloud neutral data centre in West Africa, Rack Centre, Jasper Lankhorst, has restated the company’s commitment to the green economy even as it has vowed to continually enhance its drive for sustainability in its operations.

Jasper Lankhorst made this known at the just concluded 2022 AfricaCom/Africa Tech Festival in Cape Town, South Africa.

Speaking during the panel session themed “The Importance of Going Green” for the future of Data Centres in Africa. He explained that Rack Centre, part of the pan-African data centre platform, was undertaking a range of measures that are tailored toward green design principles, some of which include switching from diesel to gas power generation, implementing water-efficient cooling systems, implementing low-energy air circulation system and sourcing local materials and services wherever possible.

According to him, the organisation is switching its power source from diesel to gas, not only to save more than $10 million a year in operating costs but also to reduce carbon footprint, reduce environmental impact and align with global sustainability data centre design trend.

“As a result of these moves, Rack Centre is forecasted to be 35% more energy-efficient than other regional data centres, and 16% more energy-efficient than the global average. It will reduce water consumption by 41%, and there will be a 45% saving in embodied energy in materials used,” he said.

He further noted that, though customers are demanding a sustainable strategy for the business, hence, the choice of going green, though capital-intensive, should be sustainable. They must be as energy efficient as possible and use reliable, low-carbon sources of power to ensure uninterrupted operations, which is in line with the organisation’s prime aim to provide 100% uptime.

Other notable panelists at the session include Mustapha Louni, Senior Vice President, Uptime Institute; Nikki Blake, Business Development Manager for Bergvik; Kevin Kent, Director of Data Center Business Development nZero; Dr. Angus Hay, Regional Executive, Africa Data Centres, and Divyajeet Mahajan, Chief Executive Officer, Distributed Power Africa (DPA), Zimbabwe.

“In addition to the existing Rack Centre LGS 1 data centre in Lagos, which supports 1.5MW of IT power, our campus is now being expanded with a new building, the LGS 2 facility which supports 12MW of IT power. This provides a total IT power of 13.5MW in the Nigeria campus, built using modern, efficient and green design architecture. We have a principle known as KIA – Keep In Africa, and it’s a philosophy we use in our design and the procurement process to make it sustainable with the availability of local knowledge and local skills to be able to build and operate it,” he added.

In June 2022, Rack Centre became the first International Finance Corporation (IFC) EDGE-certified data centre in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. It is officially making this the first Green Certified Data Centre in Africa. It is the most connected facility in the region according to its PeeringDB ranking and links every country on Africa’s Atlantic coast.

About Rack Centre: Rack Centre is the best-connected Carrier and Cloud neutral Tier III constructed Facility Certified data centre in Africa. Established in 2012, the company focuses solely on providing best-in-class data centre colocation services and free interconnection between carriers and customers. Knowing this gives customers a technically superior, physically more secure, and lower-cost environment for their information systems.

The Carrier and Cloud neutrality advantage allows customers to manage traffic to get better value, lower latency, and higher resilience and creates an open market for partnerships between customers, networks, cloud and content providers, the Internet Exchange Point of Nigeria, and managed service providers.

Rack Centre’s clientele includes 53+ telecommunication carriers, Internet Service Providers (ISPs), global Tier 1 networks, and pan Africa international carriers, including direct interconnections to all five undersea cables serving the South Atlantic Coast of Africa including Equiano and in the foreseeable future 2Africa and every country on the Atlantic coast of Africa.

Olushola Okunlade Writes

Eko Electricity Distribution Company (EKEDC) has assured it will upgrade its service delivery in Orile and Apapa environs at customer engagement forums held on November 10 and 17 respectively, in continuation of its strategic plan to engage electricity consumers across its franchise area for improved service delivery based on feedback.

The Managing Director/CEO of Eko DisCo, Dr. Tinuade Sanda, who was represented by the Chief Financial Officer, Joseph Esenwa at the forum said in continuation of the DisCo and stakeholder engagement to get on-the-spot feedback and review for possible upgrades in the areas of power supply, billing, metering, vandalism, and other factors mitigating service delivery to customers.

Mr. Esenwa thanked customers for making time out of their busy schedules to attend the session, ‘’we do not work in isolation, we are here to listen, and share ideas because we believe in a good relationship, it’s a mutually beneficial meeting, we aim to serve you, and we want to know what we have to do to improve our services” he said.

Mr. Esenwa said EKEDC has learned from engagement over the years that the major issues between the customers and the company are estimated bills, he said the DisCo has no reason to increase the bills as he described EKEDC as a retailer who purchases electricity in bulk then sends to customers.

For those who are yet to collect their prepaid meters, he said some customers had applied and paid for the prepaid meters under the MAP scheme registered without providing the right biodata when registering for the scheme.

Mr. Esenwa said, “While the commitment to install prepaid meters for customers under the MAP Scheme is critical, we have noticed that some customers provided wrong details including their valid means of identification. There is nothing we can do until they come forward to address the issue.

“Some of the incorrect details include wrong addresses, emails, applicants’ reference numbers, and invalid means of identification. The invalid biodata has delayed the issuance of receipts for the processing of the meters.

He further assured customers in Apapa and Ijora Districts respectively that the DisCo would soon visit the areas under the district to launch the mobile metering exercise for the on-the-spot applications of customers to support the existing online process of acquiring prepaid meters by customers under the MAP scheme.

Esenwa further reiterated that “The Meter Asset Provider Scheme has enabled customers to procure meters directly and be metered within 72 hours of payment confirmation and urged other customers to take advantage of the window to access their prepaid meters.