Interview: Suse country manager Grant Bennett

Loading player...
In this promoted episode of the podcast, TechCentral talks to Suse country manager Grant Bennett about the enterprise open-source software company’s partnership with SAP and how South African companies are increasingly realising the benefits of moving to cloud services.
Bennett talks about the history of Suse, which was founded 27 years ago, and its path to becoming a major player in cloud and enterprise software, including last year’s US$2.5-billion acquisition by EQT Partners and how the company plans to use that capital injection to fuel its growth plans.
The conversation then turns to the recent SAP Saphila conference at Sun City and Suse’s relationship with the software giant in deploying SAP Hana in-memory solutions into corporate South Africa.
Bennett talks about how South African businesses have begun to embrace cloud computing. A few years ago, the conversations that were taking place were very different, with most companies today actively developing cloud strategies and moving workloads onto cloud platforms, be their on-premise, public or hybrid clouds.
What impact will this shift have on corporate IT department, specifically from a skills perspective – will it lead to job losses, how should companies go about reskilling their employees and what does it mean ultimately for enterprise IT?
Bennett answers these questions and more in this fascinating discussion. Don’t miss it!
14 Jun 2019 English South Africa Technology · Business

Other recent episodes

TCS+ | Why cybersecurity is becoming a competitive advantage for SA businesses

Cybersecurity is undergoing a quiet but important shift in South African boardrooms: from a defensive cost centre to a strategic business enabler. That was the central theme of a recent TechCentral TCS+ podcast discussion featuring Vodacom Business acting executive head for cloud security Lukhanyo Zahela and KnowBe4 Africa senior vice-president…
20 Jan 35 min

Watts & Wheels S1E1 - 'William, Prince of Wheels'

TechCentral’s motoring show, Watts & Wheels, is officially back, with the first full episode of season 1 widening the lens beyond new cars to look at the forces reshaping South Africa’s automotive industry. The first episode of season 1 – you can catch our “season 0” episodes here – opens…
8 Jan 1 hr 14 min

TCS+ | Africa’s digital transformation – unlocking AI through cloud and culture

Africa’s digital transformation continues to accelerate, driven by growing cloud adoption and rising interest in artificial intelligence. Yet many organisations still face challenges in converting these ambitions into measurable business outcomes. According to Cliff de Wit, group chief innovation officer at Accelera Digital Group, the success of AI-driven initiatives depends…
11 Dec 2025 40 min

TCS+ | How Cloud on Demand helps partners thrive in the AWS ecosystem

Newly minted small businesses often struggle to establish themselves as reliable service providers among their more established competitors. To help cloud-focused business thrive, Amazon Web Services has created the AWS distribution model to support small businesses and help them grow. In this episode of TCS+, Cloud on Demand’s Xenia Rhode…
4 Dec 2025 30 min