OADC to invest $500 million in African data centers

The new African data center company, Open Access Data Centers (OADC) has announced a US$500 million, multi-year investment initiative to construct and operate a network of more than 20 carrier-neutral, GreenStar and Uptime Institute Tier III accredited data centers across Africa, optimized to serve the needs of the cloud provider and wholesale community. OADC, a West Indian Ocean Cable Company (WIOCC) Group company, will deploy data center facilities strategically throughout the continent, focusing on key locations for connectivity in each country.

OADC said it will aim to deliver an exceptional client experience, from initial contact to consultative development and deployment of future-proof solutions tailored to clients’ specific needs and to world-class, ISO-certified standards.

OADC has already started construction of its first two data center facilities, sited in Africa’s largest markets: Nigeria and South Africa. Rapid progress is being made on deploying OADC Lagos on a 4-hectare site in Lekki, the largest data center campus in West Africa.

The first phase will be ready for clients from early 2022, and when fully operational this US$200 million, Tier III certified data center will support up to 20MW site power load across more than 7,200 m2 of white space, sufficient for up to 3,275 racks and making it one of the largest facilities on the continent outside South Africa.

In addition, the site power load is fully scalable to 40MW as market demand grows. The Equiano submarine cable will be landing directly in the data center, which is also close to all other major subsea cable landings in Lagos.

OADC’s Durban facility is also under construction, and will house the cable landing for the Durban branch of the 2Africa submarine cable. It is also designed to Tier III standards and the proximity to the Durban central business district makes it ideally located to be a key component in Durban-based companies’ primary colocation and disaster recovery solutions.

In addition to offering direct and completely diverse international connectivity through the new 2Africa submarine cable, which will interconnect 33 countries in Africa, Europe, the Middle East, Pakistan and India, OADC Durban will also offer connectivity into South Africa’s terrestrial fiber network, including direct access to the NLD5 and NLD6 terrestrial fiber routes stretching 1,700 kilometers (1,056 miles) between Durban and Cape Town along South Africa’s southern coastline, and to the NLD1 fiber route direct to Johannesburg.
The initial phase of OADC Durban will be ready for clients in early 2022. When fully operational, the data center will offer more than 2,200 square meters of white space, with a further 2,000 square meters of A-grade office space also available on-site.

A third OADC facility is being deployed in Mogadishu, Somalia housing the cable landing for the Mogadishu branch of the 2Africa submarine cable and offering a range of colocation services to domestic and international businesses. OADC Mogadishu will be open to clients before the end of 2022.

All OADC facilities will operate as fully open-access, carrier-neutral facilities, supporting cloud providers and the international wholesale community in extending their businesses further into Africa. All major fiber network providers will be present in the facilities, and new dedicated diverse fiber routes will be available to existing data centers and internet exchange points (IXPs)