IXAfrica: Building East Africa’s First AI-Ready, Hyperscaler Data Centre in Kenya

Can you briefly explain what NBOX1 Online is and its Significance to the Business?

IXAfrica is the largest and AI-ready data centre in Eastern and Central Africa. We are currently building a 22.5-megawatt facility, strategically located in Nairobi near the airport, where security is a top priority. The site is positioned along key fibre routes that connect the submarine cables landing in Mombasa through to Uganda.

At the time of our last discussion, we were preparing to go live. Over the past 12 months, we have launched operations and are now serving customers at our first facility, named NBOX1. The next phase of expansion at this site will be NBOX1.2. Our second site, NBOX2, is located in Limuru, approximately 30 kilometres from our current location. The site spans 11 acres and is designed to support a 53-megawatt capacity.

At NBOX1, we have focused on building our ecosystem, particularly among connectivity clients. As a carrier-neutral data centre, maintaining neutrality is essential. Currently, more than 20 networks are integrated into our platform, and that ecosystem continues to grow.

We also host two major internet exchanges. The first is the Kenya Internet Exchange, the country’s legacy exchange. The second is the London Internet Exchange (LINX), one of the largest internet exchanges globally.

In addition to connectivity, we have expanded our enterprise client base. Several financial institutions and banks have joined us, demonstrating their trust in our facility to manage their IT infrastructure and sensitive data.

Last month, we announced a strategic partnership with Safaricom, the largest telecommunications provider in East Africa. Through this partnership, we are jointly marketing to clients. Safaricom brings strong brand recognition and established corporate relationships, while we provide a world-class data centre platform. Operating data centres is not Safaricom’s core business, so they have chosen to collaborate with a specialist like IXAfrica.

We are also engaged in discussions with hyperscalers, and some of those conversations are beginning to materialise. Several announcements related to hyperscalers entering the East African market are expected soon.

Oracle has announced plans to bring a sovereign cloud into the country to host government workloads. Microsoft has announced a significant investment of one billion dollars into Kenya to bring its regional cloud zone into the country, addressing customer needs for data sovereignty and latency. At present, the only regional deployment in Africa is in South Africa. Following that, Kenya and Nigeria have been identified as the next frontier markets. We are currently in discussions to finalise engagements with some of these players to bring them into our data centre.

In terms of AI, we are the only data centre currently capable of hosting AI workloads. Graphics processing units (GPUs) from NVIDIA and others require very high power density. We have run tests and confirmed that we can power servers requiring up to 50 kilowatts per rack. In contrast, typical enterprise clients require approximately 3 to 5 kilowatts per rack. We are now seeing traction, with AI companies entering the market to install infrastructure. Various financial services institutions and research organisations have also begun training AI models and adopting AI capabilities.

In addition to these developments, investment in submarine cable networks has evolved. Previously, telcos led such initiatives. Currently, major technology companies are investing heavily in bandwidth. Meta has invested in the 2Africa cable, which is expected to go live in the coming months. Google is also investing in the Africa-1 cable. Once operational, these cables will significantly increase available internet bandwidth in the region.

The satellite connectivity space is also progressing. SpaceX’s Starlink entered the market in late 2023, and we are serving as their teleport in this region. We host their satellite infrastructure in our data centres. Other satellite providers are expected to follow, targeting customers in Kenya and the wider region.

The data centre serves as the hub that connects all these players. We position ourselves at the centre of this ecosystem, as a leading and established provider in the market. We are well positioned to capture emerging business opportunities.

While there has been considerable public attention and announcements from various entrants, we have not yet seen major groundbreaking activity from most of them. This is what differentiates IXAfrica—we have taken the upfront risk, supported by our investors. Helios Investment Partners is one of our majority investors. Based on this equity support, we are finalising additional debt funding that will position us to capture future growth in the next one, two, three, and five years.

Overall, it has been a busy period. We have been focused on laying solid foundations, and we are prepared to support and participate in the next phase of market growth.

Is the Focus Solely on Kenya, or are there Plans to Expand into other countries in the region?

When looking at the continent, it can be segmented into two tiers. Countries such as South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Egypt, and Morocco are considered Tier 1 markets. The rest of Africa generally falls under Tier 2, primarily due to differences in digitalisation progress, market size, and opportunities.

Kenya is increasingly becoming a hub for digital infrastructure. A similar trend has been observed in Europe, where, through the European Commission and the implementation of

GDPR-based data protection regulation, countries do not necessarily need to replicate infrastructure across every region. Instead, a central hub can serve adjacent markets.

From a regulatory standpoint, Kenya has also made significant progress. The country’s data protection regulation is now in place and is largely modelled on the European Union’s GDPR framework. Through the East African Community, there is also an intention to facilitate cross-border data sharing.

As IXAfrica, the current focus is on expanding within Kenya. Through our investors, Helios, there is already investment in another entity, Morocco Data Centre (MDC). In the future, there may be consideration of developing a broader Africa-wide platform with our investors. However, that strategy would still concentrate on select Tier 1 markets.

How is Kenya’s Power Mix practically shifting your Clean Energy Sourcing Costs and ESG Positioning today?

Kenya is in a strong position, with 93 percent of its power generated through renewable sources. Not many people are aware that Kenya is the sixth-largest producer of geothermal energy globally, following regions such as Scandinavia and Iceland. The country has an abundance of geothermal resources.

There have been announcements of data centres locating directly at the source of power generation. While those deployments present opportunities, they also come with challenges. Some of those areas fall within seismic zones, and engineers conducting site surveys may not always approve such locations.

In Kenya, legislation has been passed for power wheeling, which allows consumers to buy electricity directly from the source. This regulation has been approved by Parliament and is currently awaiting gazettement. Once enacted, it will enable us to purchase power directly from sources such as Olkaria, where geothermal energy is produced. This will also support efforts to reduce energy costs.

Given this ecosystem, we do not face major concerns about ESG compliance or access to green energy. However, we continue to ensure that our construction methods and material sourcing are ESG compliant. We aim to source as much as possible locally to reduce our carbon footprint.

We work closely with our investors to measure ESG compliance through recognised independent entities such as EcoVadis. Last year, we were pleased to be certified by them, and we intend to maintain and improve on these standards in future reviews.

How are You Tackling the Skills Gap in Data Centre Operations and Cloud Engineering?

Talent development is a key priority for us. This is also influenced by my previous background, having built Moringa School.

We have a programme designed to train university students. We bring them in as interns and develop them into either mechanical or electrical engineers, providing them with a clear career path. We are currently engaging with the industry to establish a more structured programme that can scale effectively.

There is a global organisation called Nomad Futurists, which has appointed us as ambassadors for Africa. The objective is to identify talent from within the continent and train them using world-class content, provided at highly subsidised rates by leading experts and vendors.

That talent then gains practical experience through placements at data centres such as ours. From there, they may be absorbed into the local market or, considering demographic shifts and salary arbitrage, serve international markets. Africa can provide a highly capable, well-trained, and affordable talent pool to meet global demand, particularly in developed markets where there is a shortage of such skills.

This is currently in development, with the goal of establishing a structured and scalable framework for long-term talent development.

How is IXAfrica engaging in Digital Policy and Governance Discussions around AI and Data to help shape the Regional Ecosystem?

We maintain a close relationship with the government. In Kenya, a tech envoy has been appointed who reports directly to the President. He leads a steering committee focused on developing infrastructure and AI capabilities, and he also sits on the United Nations board for AI. This ensures that the country—and by extension, our business—remains aligned with the global landscape.

Our involvement with such organisations helps ensure that policies are drafted and implemented through a collaborative approach. It allows us to present the challenges we face, educate policymakers, and bring world-class benchmarks to the table. There is no need to reinvent the wheel—these frameworks have already been developed in other markets.

In our sector, which involves civil works, real estate, and power infrastructure, most countries do not apply specific regulations for data centres. In Kenya, the communications regulator has issued a consultative document. We have responded to it by sharing best practices from other regions, making the case that over-regulation could hinder investment and growth in the sector.

How are you Engineering your Cooling Systems to support High-Density AI Workloads, and have you Encountered any Challenges?

Unlike some of the older legacy data centres, which operate with outdated technology and are nearing full capacity, we are the newest entrant in the market. When designing our facility, we anticipated the requirements for high-density power workloads and advanced cooling.

Older data centres typically used underfloor cabling. In our case, we have solid floors capable of supporting greater rack weights and heights. This was pre-designed into the facility.

Our air-cooling system is based on adiabatic cooling technology. This not only provides effective cooling for high-density racks but also ensures high efficiency. We measure this using the Power Utilisation Efficiency (PUE) factor. In older data centres, cooling often consumes power equal to that used by the servers. In contrast, our system consumes only 25 percent of the server’s power consumption for cooling.

We are capable of supporting very high-density workloads of up to 50 kilowatts per rack. As GPU technology continues to evolve, there are now GPU racks requiring over 100 kilowatts. These would require liquid cooling. Our data centre is designed to be adaptable and can incorporate liquid cooling technologies as the need arises.

What are your Plans for the Next Year?

The focus for next year is to continue building on the foundations we have laid. We are optimistic about our partnership with Safaricom and expect it to help bring many local enterprise clients on board.

We aim to have some of the hyper-scalers join our platform. As the current facility reaches capacity, we plan to begin construction of NBOX1.2 and continue development at our second site, NBOX2.

We also intend to make AI a reality in our facility, positioning ourselves as the first company in the market to host AI clients. With increased demand and usage, we are preparing for future growth in AI infrastructure.

Overall, we remain focused on executing our strategy and scaling effectively in the coming year.

Is there a Message you would like to share with the International Audience—about the Country, your Company, or anything else?

IXAfrica is East Africa’s largest AI and hyper-scaler-ready facility. Unlike many announcements and speculation in the sector, we are delivering real results on the ground.

We have established our first 4.5-megawatt carrier-neutral facility, connected to over 20 clients and two Internet exchanges. We are excited to welcome international clients, whether enterprises, content delivery platforms, or cloud providers, into the country and the region.

We look forward to serving as a strategic partner for such opportunities.