Heirs Technologies, a Nigerian enterprise technology firm, is urging African businesses to prioritise technology audits, warning that outdated systems and disconnected tools are undermining operational efficiency, increasing costs, and limiting growth across the continent.

“Technology underpins nearly every aspect of modern business, including operations, decision-making, customer experience, and scalability,” Heirs Technologies says in a company blog post. “But many organisations continue to operate with underperforming or outdated systems that limit growth, drive up costs, and weaken their competitive edge.”

The company says a technology audit, described as a review of IT infrastructure, tools, and processes, is a critical first step toward “future-proofing your business with sustainable business transformation.”

Heirs Technologies, a subsidiary of Heirs Holdings founded by Nigerian businessman, Tony Elumelu, says five major warning signs signal that organisations are overdue for a technology audit: legacy systems creating hidden risk, siloed technology decisions, reliance on manual processes, rising IT costs without performance improvements, and infrastructure that cannot support future growth.

Heirs Technologies: Legacy infrastructure, fragmented tools increasing risk

“Older systems are often deeply embedded in operations, but that doesn’t mean they are still fit for purpose,” the company says. “They are harder to maintain, lack integration, and create vulnerabilities. Legacy infrastructure also limits innovation, slowing down service delivery and increasing operational costs. Worse, it puts you at risk of compliance and security failures.”

This mirrors findings from a January 2024 McKinsey report showing that African companies, on average, have about 45 percent of workloads in public cloud, on par with North America and China, yet legacy systems and legal constraints still pose a major barrier to migrating the remainder.

“Older systems are often deeply embedded in operations, but that doesn’t mean they are still fit for purpose,” the company says. “They are harder to maintain, lack integration, and create vulnerabilities. Legacy infrastructure also limits innovation, slowing down service delivery and increasing operational costs. Worse, it puts you at risk of compliance and security failures.”

Heirs Technologies also notes the organisational challenges created by fragmented technology decisions, where departments independently adopt digital tools without alignment with core IT teams. “It’s a common scenario: a department adopts a new tool without consulting IT or aligning with business strategy. The result? Disconnected systems, duplicated data, and short-term fixes that don’t scale.”

The company says a structured audit provides a unified view of what tools are in place, how they interact, and whether they deliver value against long-term business goals.

According to Heirs Technologies, many teams still rely on spreadsheets, email threads, and paper workflows, which slow productivity and increase the risk of human error.

“When teams still rely on spreadsheets, email chains, and paper workflows to complete key tasks, the inefficiencies pile up. Errors increase, response times lag, and customer satisfaction drops,” the company says in the statement.

The firm also warns about growing IT budgets that are not translating into measurable operational gains. “If your IT spending keeps increasing but user experience and operational efficiency remain stagnant, it’s time to re-evaluate,” it says. “It shouldn’t be cost vs. stability. You need cost and stability.”

Heirs Technologies says a tech audit can help identify “wasteful spending” and redirect resources toward systems that support scalability, cloud integration, and long-term growth.

Strategic push toward scalable architecture

“As your business grows, your systems must scale with you,” the company says. “If your infrastructure is rigid, patchwork, or overly dependent on legacy tools, it can’t support innovation or agility.”

The company argues that architecture “must be tunable, not fixed,” and says audits are necessary to determine readiness for technologies such as cloud adoption, API connectivity, and secure remote access—now considered essential in modern IT environments.

Heirs Technologies has recently stepped up efforts to promote enterprise digital maturity and talent development in Africa. In 2024, the company collaborated with Cisco to train young African tech professionals through its Cisco Edge Centre initiative.

The company says that while operational inefficiencies may not always be visible, they compound over time. “Operational inefficiencies and tech underperformance don’t always appear obvious, but they compound over time,” Heirs Technologies says. “A tech audit is the strategic move to uncover bottlenecks, reduce costs, and realign your IT to your growth goals.”

Africa’s digital economy is projected to contribute $712 billion to the continent’s GDP by 2050, according to a report by the International Finance Corporation and Google. However, this growth is dependent on strong IT infrastructure and modernisation of enterprise systems.

Heirs Technologies is part of the Heirs Holdings Group, which operates across multiple sectors including energy, financial services, hospitality, and healthcare. Its technology arm aims to support digital transformation efforts across both the public and private sectors in Nigeria and other African countries.