How the digital economy creates demand for data centers in Africa

In recent years, developers in Africa have launched more and more data centers on the continent. This trend is driven by the fact that Africa is home to one of the fastest-growing digital economies in the world.

Though starting from a low base, internet usage in Africa is growing rapidly. In 2013, only 11% of people in Africa were using the Internet regularly, compared to 35% in the MENA region and 35% globally (World Bank). Ten years later, in 2023, the share of people in Sub-Saharan Africa using the internet regularly tripled to 37%. In the MENA region, this share more than doubled to 78%, while the global share almost doubled to 67%.

On an annual basis, this represents an increase of 13% in Sub-Saharan Africa, 8% in the MENA region, and 7% worldwide. In other words, Sub-Saharan Africa is growing at almost twice the pace of the global average, not even considering the dramatic increase in population the region has experienced over the same period.

With this growing number of Africans using the Internet, there are more potential customers online and more business activity taking place in the digital environment. This growth is being enabled and supported by the increasing number of data centers in Africa. Next, we will look at 3 examples of planned facilities from ABiQ’s project database.

Kenya Green Energy Data Center
The Kenya Green Energy Data Center is a $9 billion project located in Kenya, East Africa. It is one of the most significant ICT investments in Africa.

Announced in early 2024, the project calls for the construction of a 1 GW geothermal-powered data center in Naivasha, near Nairobi. It will be developed in phases, starting with an initial 100 MW facility.

The developers are the Kenyan company Olkaria EcoCloud and G42, a company based in Abu Dhabi. Microsoft and the Kenya Ministry of ICT, Innovation, and Youth Affairs support these companies.

Construction is scheduled to begin at the end of 2024.

Africa Data Center, Accra
The Africa Data Center in Accra is a $300 million project located in Accra, the capital of Ghana. The project aims to build a 30 MW data center, developed by Africa Data Centers, a subsidiary of Liquid Telecom from South Africa. Africa Data Centers owns and develops several data centers across the African continent.

The U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) is providing part of the financing. The project was announced in 2022 and is currently in the planning stage.

Teraco Data Center, Nigeria
The Teraco Data Center in Nigeria is one of the many smaller planned data center projects in Africa. For $20 million, the developer Teraco Data Environments plans to build a 1-4 MW data center. The project was announced in 2021. Construction is scheduled to start in 2025, and a feasibility study is currently underway.

Article Source: abiq