Africa Data Centres, the continent’s largest network of interconnected, carrier and cloud-neutral data centre facilities, says it is building its first data centre in Kigali, citing that it would break ground in the first quarter of 2023.

The facility, the network said, will have a 2MW of IT load, and that it is expected to be purpose-built to meet growing demand in the region.

Part of data centre planning and design is to align the power and cooling requirements of the IT equipment with the capacity of infrastructure equipment to provide it.

The development comes at a time when, experts say, there is a need to increase capacity for Africa to be able to have more data centres and host more of its data.

This means that Africa’s most data is stored abroad, with the latest data indicating that only one percent of data centres are in Africa.

"It is an exciting time for Africa Data Centres,” Tesh Durvasula, the company’s CEO said, adding, "Our decision to build a data centre in Kigali was an easy one, given Rwanda’s robust economic recovery post the COVID-19 pandemic and the Government of Rwanda’s focus on digital transformation”.

"This latest announcement adds to and complements our existing investments in Rwanda and elsewhere in East Africa. We will work closely with both public and private enterprises in Rwanda to ensure that they can harness the benefits of our data centre facility to enable the provision of digital services that Rwandan citizens need,” commented Hardy Pemhiwa, Group President and CEO of Cassava Technologies.

A data centre is a repository consisting of a large group of networked computer servers and other facilities including routers, network switches and firewalls, and it is used for the remote storage, processing, or distribution of large amounts of data.

For Durvasula, "This new data centre brings three main benefits to the market – global standards, high quality of service and affordability. In addition, enterprises will achieve cost savings associated with building and maintaining their own facilities”.

Despite Rwanda being a landlocked country, AfDC says there is stable network connectivity and infrastructure connecting it to Uganda and from there to the Kenyan coast into Uganda.

Commenting on the need for colocation services in the country, Durvasula says the local enterprise market is eager to benefit from Africa Data Centres’ colocation services and a stable data centre environment.

"They will also be able to make the most of global connectivity through a range of global service providers and cloud service providers.”