The
Africa Data Centres has received an $83 million loan from the US state-owned
finance Agency, Development Finance Corporation (DFC) as part of its first disbursement
of a $300 million loan.
The
loan, according to the Development Finance Corporation (DFC) during its
announcement of the facility, is aimed at supporting the development, expansion,
and operations of data centres in South Africa, Kenya, and other DFC-eligible
countries.
“DFC’s
investment in Africa Data Centres helps expand critical information and
communications technology infrastructure in South Africa, Kenya, and other
countries in the region,” said DFC CEO Scott Nathan. “Building secure, trusted
information technology networks will help enable development and economic
growth throughout Africa.”
“Africa
Data Centres is pleased to work with DFC to expand our facilities and network
throughout Africa,” said Africa Data Centres CEO Tesh Durvasula. “This
financing supports our efforts to build scaleable, efficient, resilient,
secure, and sustainable infrastructure that supports Africa’s adoption of
world-class cloud services.”
The
DFC is a development finance institution and agency of the United States
federal government focused on investing in development projects primarily in
lower- and middle-income countries. It was formed in 2019 by merging the
Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) with the Development Credit
Authority (DCA) of the United States Agency for International Development
(USAID), as well as with several smaller offices and funds.
The
DFC said the loan was ‘a key investment’ advancing the Biden Administration’s
Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment (PGII). Formed in 2021,
PGII is a collaborative effort by the G7 to fund infrastructure projects in
developing nations; it is considered to be the bloc's response to China's Belt
and Road Initiative.
ADC
has or is developing data centers in Nairobi,
Kenya; Lagos,
Nigeria; Lomé,
Togo; and the Samrand and Midrand areas
of Johannesburg as well as the Diep River area of Cape Town, South Africa. It
recently announced plans to build a 30MW data
center in Accra, Ghana as well as a second 20MW
facility in Cape Town, South Africa.
