Data centre investment in Africa has grown since the COVID-19 pandemic which forced many businesses to embrace cloud computing for their operations. A report by market researcher, ReportLinker, shows that Africa’s data center market size by investment was valued at $2 billion in 2020 and is expected to grow to $5 billion by 2025, growing at a CAGR of 15 percent during 2021-2026.
Despite the growth, Africa’s contribution to the global data centre market is still less than 1 percent which is a major concern for policymakers on the continent. However, West Indian Ocean Cable Company (WIOCC) sees it as an opportunity and could be a thing of the past as it ramps up investment in the space.
Armed with a $500 million fund to be invested over five years, WIOCC has plans to dot the landscape across Africa with data centres, an ambition that will ultimately deliver the continent’s first data centre hub.
As a result of that goal, the company through its subsidiary, Open Access has built 30 edge data centres in South Africa.
Edge data centres are located closer to the users and their devices that collect and transmit data, or whatever data is being generated. Typically, they are powered by edge caching – hardware – or software-based components that temporarily store data to increase computing response time. Edge data centres are smaller and less powerful than core data centres. Edge data centres can deliver lower latency data processing than core data centres.
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Ayotunde Coker, CEO of Open Access, said the company plans to replicate South Africa’s 30 edge data centres in Lagos, Nigeria. The company already started construction of the largest four-hectare data centre campus in West Africa. Last week, the company showed the significant progress that has been made on the project. Currently, there are two floors, a white space that has capacity for over 400 racks right.
When fully operational, the $200 million, Tier III certified data centre will support up to 20MW site power load across more than 7,200m2 of white space, sufficient for up to 3,275 racks and making it one of the largest facilities on the continent outside South Africa. The site power load is fully scalable to 40MW as market demand grows.
The Lagos data centre would provide support for the edge data centres it plans to deploy in other parts of the country and West Africa.
In general, WIOCC hopes to deploy more than 20 new core data centres in strategic locations throughout the continent, focusing on major connectivity hubs in each country.
WIOCC has made unprecedented strides with the hosting of Google’s Equaino cable in Nigeria and 2Africa by Meta (former Facebook) in its Durban data centre. It is building out its infrastructure to also host submarine cables already landing on the West African shore. The data centre in Lagos will provide colocation facilities and ultra-reliable, seamless connectivity directly into new international subsea systems, eliminating the costs and risks traditionally associated with terrestrial backhauling.
“We focus on the main points where we deliver the infrastructure; make sure it is world-class – next-generation connectivity. We provide the baseline connectivity and infrastructure for other providers to ride on that deliver connectivity to the point of use, of course, security, and real-time operational management,” Coker said.
The company is also providing the next level of security. According to Coker, the data centres would come with a minimum seven-tier stage of security. There is also a security provision for customers that may want customised safety.
