Cassava Technologies, a global technology leader of African heritage and AXON Networks (AXON), a global leader in intelligent network platforms, today announced a strategic partnership to co-develop, deploy, and manage Africa\u2019s first end-to-end Operator-as-a-Service (OaaS) platform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A bold step in unlocking Africa\u2019s AI and digital future, customers and service providers will leverage AXON\u2019s AI-ready, real-time, multi-tenant, digital twin-enabled platform across Cassava\u2019s extensive high-speed fibre backbone to connect millions of people and businesses across the continent and unlock new pathways for economic development and innovation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The partnership was announced at Counder Conference 2026 in Cape Town, South Africa, the flagship event of the Counder visionary leadership network, where 500 global investors, family office principals and corporate decision-makers meet for one of the largest international private capital gatherings ever assembled in the Southern Hemisphere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAs businesses of all sizes continue to digitise their operations, the need is for cost-effective, flexible, high-performance network solutions that reduce time-consuming manual design and configurations. By partnering with AXON Networks, we are moving beyond traditional hardware-centric infrastructure to create a truly programmable, AI-managed network, which will significantly reduce operational costs and increase access to customers and service providers\u201d, said Hardy Pemhiwa, President & Group CEO of Cassava Technologies. \u201cThis transformation allows us to treat our pan-continental fibre network as a dynamic digital platform, enabling us to provision and modify customer networks in near real-time, rather than days or weeks. We are going beyond connectivity to becoming a partner in the digital transformation journeys of our customers\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This AI-first connectivity platform becomes the foundation for accelerating digital transformation for African businesses of all sizes, including other telecommunications service providers. The Operator-as-a-Service platform will deliver secure, private, high-speed data infrastructure, enabling mobile network operators, LEO satellite providers and internet service providers (ISPs) with unprecedented agility, intelligence, and reach. It is designed to support these service providers in unlocking new opportunities for growth, innovation, and AI adoption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cPartnering with Cassava, with its unmatched fibre footprint across the continent and investment in AI-enabled data centres, to integrate our Operator-as-a-Service platform with real-time digital twin technology at this scale, is incredibly exciting,\u201d said Martin Manniche, CEO and founder of AXON Networks. \u201cWe\u2019re not just mirroring networks \u2014 we\u2019re virtualising an entire infrastructure into a live AI-driven ecosystem that will leverage this extensive backbone, including Cassava\u2019s planned AI-powered factory, to bring growth, prosperity, and the promise of AI sovereignty to Africa and its people. This is a transformational opportunity to provide the foundational platform for the AI economy across the African continent and redefine the future for generations to come, and we couldn\u2019t have found a better partner than Cassava to bring this vision to fruition.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We are honoured that Cassava Technologies and AXON Networks have chosen Counder Conference 2026 as the platform for this groundbreaking announcement,” said Michel Weiss, Founding Partner and CEO, and Leonard Stiegeler, Founding Partner and Chairman of Counder. “This partnership exemplifies exactly what Counder is designed to foster: trusted connections between visionary leaders that spark meaningful collaboration and drive tangible impact. When world-class organisations come together in Cape Town to advance their work in emerging trends & markets, we see the power of our mission in action: connecting leaders to collaborate on tomorrow’s most important opportunities.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
AXON\u2019s breakthrough OaaS solution creates a living, dynamic model of Cassava\u2019s fibre network, comprising more than 110,000 km of terrestrial and submarine fibre, satellite capacity, and wireless connectivity. By turning networks into self-learning, autonomous, self-optimising systems, AXON\u2019s Digital Twin technology reduces operational complexity, accelerates service delivery, introduces cost efficiencies, and ensures resilient connectivity at scale.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Cassava Technologies, a global technology leader of African heritage and AXON Networks (AXON), a global leader in intelligent network platforms, today announced a strategic partnership to co-develop, deploy, and manage Africa\u2019s first end-to-end Operator-as-a-Service (OaaS) platform. A bold step in unlocking Africa\u2019s AI and digital future, customers and service providers will leverage AXON\u2019s AI-ready, real-time, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":8306,"template":"","news-cat":[39],"class_list":["post-8299","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-cat-partnerships"],"yoast_head":"\n