Professor Abubakar, a Professor of Petroleum Geosciences, has over two decades of working experience spanning the academia, oil and gas exploration research, development and innovation institutions. He is a strategic thinker with strong leadership and management skill. He has an impressive exposure to global best practice in the field of energy.
Prior to his appointment as MD/CEO of Galaxy Backbone Limited, he was the Executive Director and a Principal start-up for the establishment and development of the National Centre for Petroleum Research and Development of the Energy Commission of Nigeria, where he spearheaded a cross-cutting edge research that developed the conceptual exploration model deployed in the successful oil and gas exploration in the frontier basin of the Northeast Nigeria. He was also a Research Consultant to NNPC on oil and gas exploration.
Under his leadership, Galaxy Backbone has helped the Federal government recoup several billions of naira lost to hosting data internationally via the establishment of in country data centres by GBB.
Recently, a National Shared Services Centre which was completed by his administration was commissioned by President Muhammadu Buhari in December 2022. The state-of-the-art Data centre makes provision for secure and available Data centre services across the nation with hosting and collocation services.
GBB was created for the benefit of public institutions and in fact other private sector establishments that would like to take advantage of its huge infrastructure across the nation. That is why, apart from growing its coverage of public institutions beyond the four walls of the Federal Capital Territory — now at over 5,000 institutions across a number of states — the organisation has in the last two years under the leadership of its Managing Director/Chief Executive, Professor Muhammad Bello Abubakar, given a renewed focus to the regional operations of the organisation like never before. This is clearly because of Professor Muhammad’s belief that Galaxy Backbone’s success is not restricted to a particular location, but across the 36 states of the country in the short to medium term and for Professor Muhammed, in the long term, Galaxy Backbone would provide similar operations across other countries within Sub-Saharan Africa.
For his visionary leadership whose impact has extended beyond GBB but the nation’s public sector, Professor Muhammad Bello Abubakar is awarded the 2022 NEWSDIRECT AWARD OF EXEMPLARY LEADERSHIP IN PUBLIC SERVICE.