Wingu Africa inaugurates a first of its kind data center in Ethiopia to provide a data infrastructure service that allows telecommunication and financial institutions to exchange information.
Located at the ICT Park, the data center is indicated to be both a carrier and cloud-neutral in design to ensure that customers are always enjoying uninterrupted services, with independent back-up systems for power, cooling, and network connectivity.
“With the introduction of our carrier- neutral data center, Wingu is proud to offer a technological ecosystem that will drive innovation, foster collaboration, and enable growth and opportunity,” said Anthony Voscarides, CEO of Wingu.africa, while speaking at the inauguration event held on Tuesday, June 13, 2023, adding, “Wingu.africa Data Center will provide affordable and secure data services to any public or private institution.”
As indicated by the group, the construction of the data center cost 50 million dollars. The center which is built on a 161,500 sq ft (15,000 sq m) plot of land, will offer a capacity of 10MW across 800 racks when fully operational. The main facility that is said to have taken 24 months to construct not only meets Tier III standards but also will see Ethiopia hosting its first internet exchange.
“The core objectives of hosting this Internet exchange in the Wingu data center are to deliver cost-effective, faster, and more reliable internet services, further accelerating Ethiopia’s digital growth,” indicated the Group.
“The Group is exploring further expansion plans in different parts of the country for more investment to meet the needs of the growing Ethiopian economy,” said Nicholas Lodge, Chief Strategy Officer of the Group.
The Wingu group operates in Ethiopia, Djibouti, Somaliland, and Tanzania providing the highest standards of security, technology, and regulatory-compliant data center services.
By offering access to multiple networks and cloud infrastructure, Wingu empowers businesses through choice and ultimately the benefit of improved service levels and competitive pricing. Wingu’s data center will also support initiatives to bring additional data capacity to Ethiopia through connectivity to global fiber optic cable systems, while also enticing major content providers such as Meta, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Alibaba, Microsoft, and Google.
The company is also said to be planning a new data center and cable landing station that will be Tier III certified and host 11 cables. It is also looking to expand its existing data centers and has signed deals with “several strategic customers”.