NextDC has opened its first data centre in Adelaide, providing the government, defence and space sectors with greater access to critical digital infrastructure amid an AI-driven compute boom.
The $100 million facility arrives as NextDC rival AirTrunk is set to be sold to US private equity group Blackstone and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board for more than $23 billion.
It is the second NextDC data centre to open in less than a month and follows capital raising efforts by other major data centre providers, underscoring the current battle for data centre supremacy in Australia.
The 5-megawatt (MW) Adelaide data centre, opened on Wednesday, offering 2,922 square metres of technical space to state government, defence, space, health, mining and resources industries.
As Adelaide’s first Tier IV certified data centre, the facility is built to be completely fault tolerant and guarantees 100 per cent uptime, ensuring secure, low-latency access for cloud and digital service providers.
NextDC chief executive Craig Scroggie said the new facility will “play a pivotal role in accelerating digital innovation” in the state and allow it to tap into the boom in artificial intelligence.
“A1 Adelaide… offers high density power, liquid cooling and diverse connectivity, and will provide real-time responsiveness to mission-critical requirements for key South Australian industries such as aerospace, defence and mining,” he said.
“Additionally, with global tech’ companies expanding their footprint to include a presence in Adelaide, A1 will provide AI certified, trusted critical infrastructure to drive their innovation ambitions as well as make the state attractive for ongoing investment.”
South Australian Treasurer Stephen Mullighan said the data centre would provide “large-scale investment opportunities for local and global organisations seeking to leverage our state as a platform for economic growth, innovation and development”.
“The South Australian business and government sectors will be able to substantially improve the resilience of their digital products and services offered to citizens, customers and partners…” he added.
Other data centre providers with facilities in South Australia include Equinix, YourDC, DCI, Adelaide-based Colocity, Vocus, AAPT and Telstra, according to the Data Center Map.
AirTrunk, which is reportedly in the process of finalising its sale, has data centres in Sydney and Melbourne, but not in South Australia. CDC and Macquarie Data Centres are also without facilities in the state.
AirTrunk last year overtook NextDC as the data centre provider with the largest greenhouse gas emissions in Australia, according to corporate emissions and energy reporting data.
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