Digital infrastructure provider, DAMAC Data Centers, owned by the DAMAC Group, will open facilities in Riyadh and Dammam, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) before the end of 2023.
The company announced a further 35 megawatts IT capacity at LEAP 2023, that will be built in addition to the 20 megawatts which is already under construction.
Initially, each facility will launch with 5 megawatts IT capacity in the last quarter 2023. Another 5 megawatts will be added in Q1 2024. By 2025, both facilities will deliver a total of 55 megawatts IT capacity. The investment in the Kingdom of circa USD $600 million is part of US$1 billion data centre development strategy.
DAMAC has accelerated its data centre roll outs owing to local and international customer demand. Customers are finalizing agreements for securing all available capacity in these facilities with deals closing before 2023 ends. The facilities in Dammam and Riyadh are Uptime Institute certified Tier 3 classified. These will provide highly connected hubs in one of the regions with fast developing digital economies.
“KSA holds a unique position in the MENA region. Its borders touch more countries than almost any other and it is an ideal jumping off point for connecting across Africa and the GCC. Our facilities in Dammam and Riyadh offer local diversity as well as rapid access to subsea cable systems that serve regional and global needs,” said Hussain Sajwani, Chairman of DAMAC Group. “KSA has a young, digitally savvy population and a lot to offer in terms of digital innovation and smart cities. We look forward to supporting the growth of its digital economy.”
Saudi Arabia is among the most locally and globally connected regions in the GCC. It has 14 in-service subsea cables, out of which 11 land in Jeddah. The KSA national fibre network provides terrestrial connectivity to all prominent Gulf markets along with acting as a gateway to key regional submarine cable landing stations.
DAMAC’s facilities align with Saudi Vision 2030 and its strategy for accelerating development and growth locally.
“We are selecting locations for data centre facilities based on local demographics, the state of digital adoption, and opportunities to support long-term economic growth. Every site location we choose must meet strict criteria based on future demand rather than who needs rack space today,” said Mr Sajwani.
“Our Dammam and Riyadh sites more than meet these criteria and these will be two of several facilities that we are planning in the KSA. We’re excited to ramp up our builds and deliver data centre facilities that serve local market needs.”
Over the past 12 months, the DAMAC Data Center team has grown rapidly to support customer demand and new facilities going live. Its globally experienced management team works with third party suppliers and to deliver operational capabilities for serving world-leading businesses. DAMAC delivers new levels of application performance, service performance and user experience to enable local digital innovation, while keeping data in-country.
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