NIGERIA – Rack Centre, West Africa’s leading carrier neutral data center operator, has announced an expansion programme that will increase capacity to a total net lettable white space of 6000 square metres.

This according to Rack Center, will pave way for 13MW of IT power capacity in its Lagos campus.

The expansion is expected to bring carrier neutral scale to West Africa, and this is in response to increasing demand for data centre space from cloud uptake, telecommunication investment and outsourcing of IT facilities by enterprises in the region.

The funding for this expansion will come from a $250m pan-African data centre platform, established by Actis and Convergence Partners, a leading ICT infrastructure investor in Africa.

In addition to the expansion in Rack Centre, the platform is also actively developing additional buy and build opportunities across Africa, to establish a network of carrier neutral data centres aimed at catering to carrier, cloud and hyperscale customers.

Earlier in March, Actis, a London private equity firm, announced an investment in Rack Centre, taking a controlling stake in the business alongside Jagal providing the necessary financing for the expansion programme.

The Data Center expansion is important given that Nigeria is a key entry point for global telecommunications, content, and cloud players seeking access to the region.

The lack of cost-effective, energy-efficient IT infrastructure, has however been a constraint to doing business in the region.

Rack Center has however been trying to address this deficiency in IT infrastructure by bringing global best practice to Nigeria and is the first carrier neutral data centre in the region, to achieve Uptime Institute Tier III Certification of Constructed Facility (TCCF).

The Center recently appointed Tim Parsonson, Co-founder, Teraco Data Environments – the largest carrier neutral operator in Africa as chairman of its Board to provide the expertise required to successfully implement its expansion plans.

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