Open Access Data Centres (OADC), a pan-African operator, has announced the expansion of its Johannesburg data center in South Africa. The second phase of the Isando facility, expected to be completed by Q1 2024, will bring an additional 4MW of power and 600 racks to the existing infrastructure.

JNB1, launched in December 2022, is 90% subscribed and has up to 1,600 sqm of IT white space and a site load capacity of 7MW. The company is expanding its data center to take advantage of the growing demand for data center services. 

Darren Bedford, the Group Chief Business Development Officer at OADC’s parent company, WIOCC Group, expressed excitement about the rapid progress and high demand, stating, “It has been an incredible year, and the traction we have obtained in the initial phase of this development has been such that the majority of the data center is already occupied.”

WIOCC (West Indian Ocean Cable Company), the parent company of OADC, raised $200 million in November 2021 to launch a pan-African data center network. OADC, with plans to invest $500 million over the next five years, already operates data centers in Lagos, Nigeria; Kinshasa, DRC; and multiple locations in South Africa, including Johannesburg, Durban, and Cape Town.

The company envisions expanding its footprint to 20 countries across Africa, including Accra, Ghana; Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire; and Mombasa & Nairobi, Kenya. Additionally, OADC has previously announced plans for a data center site in Mogadishu, Somalia.

As part of the broader WIOCC network, established in 2008, the company is involved in consortiums for major undersea cable systems such as EASSy, EIG, WACS, TE North, SEA-ME-WE 5, and the Facebook-led 2Africa cable systems. Recently, WIOCC launched Open Access Technical Services (OATS), a new managed network and infrastructure services company, further solidifying its presence in the African data center landscape.