Dimension Data and its parent, Japan’s NTT, on Monday announced plans to build new a huge new data centre in Johannesburg.

Construction on the companies’ Johannesburg 1 Data Centre has commenced, Dimension Data said in a statement. It will be located near OR Tambo International Airport and will offer diverse fibre connectivity, fully redundant power supply and cooling infrastructure.

The site includes plans to host an NTT Technology Experience Lab for clients and partners to test and validate technology solutions and IT deployments in a live data centre environment.

The data centre design is based on tier-3 standards and will be constructed in two phases. When fully built, it will deliver a total of 6 000sq m of IT space and 12MW of IT load. The first phase of the site is scheduled to become operational in early 2022.

Dimension Data already operates 11 data centres with up to 10MW of IT load across Africa.

Demand

“This demand for capacity is driven by local and international clients’ strong need for robust co-location infrastructure across Africa and will allow Dimension Data to meet the increasing requirements of its clients across the continent and Middle East,” the statement said.

“The Johannesburg 1 Data Centre will enable us to increase our capabilities and global capacity, to meet our international clients’ expanding needs for infrastructure across the African market,” said Florian Winkler, CEO of the Global Data Centres Europe, Middle East & Africa division of NTT. – © 2020 NewsCentral Media