African data center operator ST Digital has opened its first Tier III data center in Gabon located in the Nkok Special Economic Zone near the capital city Libreville. According to the Gabonese government, the sovereign data center features 1 MW of electrical power and can house up to 3,000 physical servers.
The data center is designed to be modular and scalable in order to support the growing needs of the government, businesses and financial institutions in the country. The first phase of the data center includes 65 m² of colocation space. A government press release says the facility offers the lowest latency in the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC) via a direct connection to the ACE and SAT-3/WASC subsea cable systems.
“This project is proof that no ambition is too big for Gabonese land,” Laïka Mba, Director General, ST Digital Gabon said in a statement.
The data center runs on a 15 kV power supply with 150 kVA and 100 kVA generators offering backup power along with a UPS system. The state says that 22 percent of the facility’s energy is provided by a photovoltaic power plant.
“Ultimately, this infrastructure will allow Gabon to reduce its dependence on data centers located outside the continent, while meeting the growing requirements of data localization, cybersecurity, regulatory compliance and digital sovereignty. It will also offer banks, public administrations, telecom operators, industries, fintechs and technological startups a reference infrastructure adapted to international standards,” the state said.
The first phase of the data center will host state, business, and individual data on local servers for the first time. The sovereignty of the data center is the real selling point as Gabon moves to cement itself as a power house in the Central African economy and offer local businesses digital infrastructure and services that live in the country.
“Data sovereignty is no longer an obstacle to be circumvented. It is becoming a full-fledged design principle, ensuring that infrastructures can evolve alongside the geopolitical landscape while fostering innovation and keeping data secure and compliant,” Jean-Francis Ahanda, ST Digital Group Chief Technology Officer, said in a statement following a meeting with the Ministry of the Digital Economy of the Gabonese Republic in June.
While Gabon is still a nascent data center market, a few projects are underway. US technology firm Cybastion is leading a 20 MW data center development project in the Nkok Special Economic Zone with the government building a gas power plant to supply energy to the facility. Porteo Group will be leading construction on that site.