How Cloudflare’s London Office Brought Black History to Life
When I joined Cloudflare in February 2019, my onboarding trip to the San Francisco headquarters left a lasting first impression. At the reception desk sat a bouquet of Proteas, South Africa’s national flower. That small gesture made me feel instantly at home in the company. It was also the start of a broader cultural discovery: the same week marked US Black History Month, celebrated at the office with African cuisine, spotlighted icons on company screens, and drummers. The effort was organized by Afroflare—an Employee Resource Group (ERG) dedicated to honoring the Black community—and its impact signaled to me both the value of the group and how seriously Cloudflare treats heritage celebrations.
Fast forward to 2020, and I found myself leading the UK Black History Month programming from London as one of Afroflare’s leads. The timing made the celebration uniquely important. Just months before, the murder of George Floyd had galvanized global attention on the Black Lives Matter movement, Nigeria’s #EndSARS protests had drawn international headlines and retaliatory cyber attacks, and Kamala Harris had been elected US Vice President as the first woman, African-American, and Asian-American to hold the office. Against this backdrop, we designed the UK events around three themes: the Past, the Present, and the Future of Black history.
Honoring the Past, Mapping the Future
Our celebrations of the past acknowledged the contributions of African and Caribbean heritage pioneers. Those stories lived on through internal emails and social media posts that documented their achievements. For the present, Cloudflare TV fired up a series of fireside chats and interviews that brought everyday history-makers to a global audience. The future lens looked forward to rising stars and the actions they are taking today that will define the history of tomorrow.
To highlight current contributions within Cloudflare, we organized knowledge-sharing sessions:
- Business Development, led by Stephen Thompson
- Customer Development, with Jay Henderson
- Customer Success Management, presented by Warren Rickards
Recordings of these talks are available on Cloudflare TV.
Beyond internal presentations, we hosted conversations with outside voices who are reshaping technology and community infrastructure. Those guests included:
- Lungisa Matshoba, CTO and Founder of Yoco, a South African payments company simplifying point-of-sale transactions for small businesses.
- Thando Tetty, Head of Engineering at Investec UK, who talked through his career journey from Eswatini to South Africa to the UK.
- Ayotunde Coker, Managing Director at Rack Centre in Nigeria, interviewed by Cloudflare CSO and Afroflare Executive Advocate Joe Sullivan about Africa’s Internet landscape and notable innovations.
A Remote, Company-Wide Experience
The spread of our workforce made remote-first, globally accessible events essential. Infrastructure like Cloudflare TV and Cloudflare for Teams enabled us to invite the whole company—and the world—to participate. This marked the first ever remote, company-wide UK Black History Month at Cloudflare.
Growing up in South Africa, where Black history is interwoven into daily life rather than confined to a designated month, I saw this as an opportunity to push boundaries beyond the calendar. By holding these conversations now, we emphasize an enduring message of hope and ask ourselves how we can honor Black contributions every single day, not just in October.
The goal is to build a legacy of possibility through stronger diversity and inclusion—believing that potential grows when people believe in themselves. Nelson Mandela captured that sentiment in 2005:
“Sometimes it falls upon a generation to be great. You can be that great generation. Let your greatness blossom.” — London's Trafalgar Square
