Teraco – AfricanCloud

[South Africa] Teraco breaks ground on JB5 – A 30MW data centre expansion to the Isando Campus

Africa’s interconnection hub and vendor-neutral data centre provider Teraco has commenced construction on a new hyperscale data centre facility with 30 megawatts (MW) of critical power load at its Isando Campus in Ekurhuleni, east of Johannesburg, South Africa.

The facility, known as JB5, is scheduled for completion in 2024 and will incorporate the latest environmentally sustainable cooling and water management designs.

CEO of Teraco, Jan Hnizdo, said that the company continues with solid growth as enterprise and hyperscale requirements continue apace due to sustained demand for hybrid cloud deployments and the adoption of cloud services in Africa. “South Africa is a springboard for cloud provision into Africa and, as a result, has become the technology and data centre hub for sub-Saharan Africa. Massive global investments into undersea cables, like Equiano and 2Africa, further strengthen this position. This will enable global cloud providers to service not only the South African market but also the rest of the sub-Saharan African region.”

“Teraco is committed to growing its capacity footprint across its core hubs. We ensure our clients have the flexibility to scale and take advantage of the digital transformation across sub-Saharan Africa. We continue to invest significantly in the region’s ICT infrastructure and have built Africa’s largest data centre platform. We take pride in enabling open access interconnection and providing world-class data centre infrastructure for all our clients,” concludes Hnizdo.

The JB5 facility is Teraco’s eighth data centre development located in the heart of Ekurhuleni’s Aerotropolis. It is here that Teraco’s data centres already provide access to a wide choice of network service providers, peering at NAPAfrica, regional IXPs, content delivery networks and cloud provider on-ramps. Hnizdo says that this expansion aims to further support sub-Saharan enterprises by advancing their digital transformation strategies and enabling global cloud providers to expand their footprints —spurring innovation.

JB5 has been designed to put sustainability first and minimise its environmental footprint. JB5 will incorporate the latest state-of-the-art cooling designs, a closed-loop chilled water system that incorporates 100% free air cooling. This design will bring about industry-leading PUEs, thereby reducing the energy consumed and limiting water used in the ongoing cooling process to zero.

JB5 is the latest expansion to Teraco’s growing data centre platform and takes critical power load capacity at Teraco facilities to 156MW, which includes the Isando Campus facilities; JB1/JB3/JB5 (70MW), Bredell Campus JB2/JB4 (64MW), Cape Town Campus CT1/CT2 (21MW) and Durban (1MW).

Organisations working to accelerate their digital transformation utilise Teraco to dynamically scale their IT infrastructure, adopt hybrid multi-cloud architectures and interconnect with strategic business partners within the Platform Teraco ecosystem of global and local clients.

www.teraco.co.za

[South Africa] Teraco completes JB4, the latest hyperscale data centre expansion to the Bredell Campus

Teraco has announced the completion of the first phase of JB4, its new hyperscale data centre addition to the Bredell Campus, Ekurhuleni, east of Johannesburg, South Africa.

The new facility supports the growing demand by enterprises and cloud providers for data centre capacity. JB4 offers highly resilient and secure colocation facilities in line with Teraco’s long-term vision of enabling digital transformation across Africa.

As one of Africa’s economic powerhouses, Gauteng (the greater Johannesburg Metropol) is a logical destination for Teraco’s continued investment in data centre infrastructure on the continent. Home to digitally connected enterprises, including telecommunications, financial services, e-commerce, logistics, and retail, the Johannesburg Metropol benefits from its enviable location in the heart of southern Africa, which has led to it becoming the hub for connectivity and peering.

JB4 represents a strategic addition to Platform Teraco, offering enterprises and cloud providers a scalable platform for IT infrastructure deployment while sustaining performance, reliability, security, and the most comprehensive network choice. The first phase of JB4 comprises 30 000sqm of building structure, 8 000sqm of data hall space, and 19 megawatts (MW) of critical power load. Teraco has secured adjacent land and power for Phase 2 expansion, bringing the total critical power load in the facility to 50MW at the end state.

The JB4 addition to Teraco’s growing data centre platform takes critical power load capacity at Teraco facilities to 126MW, which includes the Isando Campus JB1/JB3 (40MW), Bredell Campus JB2/JB4 (64MW), Cape Town Campus CT1/CT2 (21MW) and Durban (1MW).

This data centre facility dramatically extends Platform Teraco’s capacity in South Africa, according to Jan Hnizdo, CEO, of Teraco: “Forming a vital part of the African IT landscape, Platform Teraco is an essential part of the modern enterprise’s digital transformation strategy with its diverse industry ecosystems and open interconnection marketplace.” JB4 is connected to all the other Teraco data centres through the diverse ecosystem of network operators in the facility, making it ideal for the distributed interconnection-defined architecture of the modern enterprise.

Hnizdo says that the majority of enterprise organisations are accelerating their digital transformation strategies and placing a greater focus on cloud adoption strategies: “Enterprises are looking for the ability to scale as network strategies evolve, and in a world where fast and secure interconnection with strategic business partners is a priority, this is a source of competitive advantage.”

Hnizdo said that the company continues to see significant growth as hyperscale requirements expand due to increased demand for cloud services in Africa. “The continued increase of cloud adoption in Africa is also being enabled by investments in critical infrastructure, including hyperscale data centre facilities such as JB4. This will enable global cloud clients to service the South African market and the rest of the sub-Saharan African region.”

www.teraco.co.za

[South Africa] Teraco helps VMware cloud providers drive carbon neutrality

Teraco Data Environments has announced an initiative to enable VMware Cloud Verified partners using Teraco data centre facilities achieve VMware Zero Carbon Committed status and badging.

This will help enterprise clients and cloud providers in Sub-Saharan Africa transition to zero-carbon clouds and pursue sustainability and supply chain decarbonisation strategies.

As a provider of colocation data centres and interconnection platforms in Africa, Teraco made significant strides in building a sustainable future for its business and its clients, with activities spanning the environment, social governance, and community upliftment. Despite challenging regulations and legislation around the generation and supply of renewable energy in South Africa, Teraco is committed to accelerating the shift to renewable energy and offering its clients, including cloud providers, a route to reduce their carbon footprint.

Teraco has committed to powering its data centre colocation facilities with 50% renewable energy by 2027 and 100% by 2035. It will also maximise its combined rooftop solar footprint across its facilities to 6MW by 2023. VMware Cloud Verified Providers who host their cloud platforms at the Teraco data centre facilities have an opportunity to leverage Teraco’s sustainability commitment to attain Zero Carbon Committed status.

“At Teraco, we understand that our success lies in tandem with that of our clients. This is why sustainability is a business imperative; it goes beyond just renewable energy and our environmental impact, extending to our people’s well-being and development, how we support and uplift our communities and making sure we continue to grow our business in the right way,” said Bryce Allan, Head of Sustainability, Teraco Data Environments.

“Teraco’s sustainability goals extend to investing in our rooftop and utility-scale solar energy programme as well as partnering or working with 3^rd party renewable energy providers and stakeholders across the private and public sector to deliver renewable energy to our facilities. Working with VMware Cloud Providers, this initiative is the perfect catalyst to assist VMware Cloud Verified partners and their clients who want to move to the cloud and pursue their sustainability goals,” added Allan.

This initiative has been met with resounding support from Teraco’s clients and the South African-based VMware Cloud Verified Partner community, many of which use Teraco’s data centre facilities. Five of these partners have just recently achieved VMware Zero Carbon Committed status.

“Teraco has set ambitious targets and is pioneering the shift to carbon neutrality within the African data centre industry. Its Environmental, Social and Governance goals and commitments are closely aligned to VMware’s 2030 Agenda. This collaboration provides VMware Cloud Verified Providers with an invaluable and timely opportunity to jump-start their transition to zero-carbon clouds and, in turn, enable their clients to decarbonise their digital footprints,” said Sumeeth Singh, Cloud Provider Business Head, VMware Sub-Saharan Africa.

Teraco is dedicated to protecting, connecting, and growing the enterprises and ecosystems shaping Africa’s digital future sustainably and responsibly. In line with this objective, Teraco recently underwent an independent ESG sustainability rating through EcoVadis and obtained a silver rating. The rating scores the ESG performance of a company across several themes, including Environment, Labour and Human Rights, Ethics and Sustainable Procurement.

“We are delighted to be working in collaboration with VMware; their focus on carbon neutrality resonates with that of Teraco, as we have an open access platform philosophy offering connections to all the cloud onramps, both public and private,” said Michele McCann, Head Interconnection & Peering, Teraco Data Environments.

www.teraco.co.za

www.vmware.com

[South Africa] Teraco announces access to Oracle Cloud via FastConnect

South African data centre company Teraco will now offer connectivity directly through Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) FastConnect at its Isando Campus for the Oracle Cloud Johannesburg Region.

The company which is also a member of Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) says Oracle customers will now be able to harness the power of Oracle Cloud locally, including Oracle Autonomous Database, to help enable them to unlock innovation and drive business growth.

It says Oracle Cloud Infrastructure FastConnect, now also via Teraco’s Africa Cloud Exchange, may potentially provide higher -bandwidth options and potentially more reliable and consistent networking experience compared to Internet-based connections.

With OCI, customers benefit from best-in-class security, consistent high performance, simple predictable pricing, and the tools and expertise needed to bring any workload to the cloud relatively quickly and efficiently.

“Our direct connections to OCI builds upon our commitment to ensure that our clients have direct, secure access to the critical IT resources they need to drive business success,” said Teraco CEO Jan Hnizdo. “The demand for Oracle Cloud in our market is a testament to its strength, and we are extremely pleased to be working closely with Oracle to accelerate their service delivery.”

OCI’s extensive network of the currently more than 70 FastConnect global and regional partners offer customers dedicated connectivity to Oracle Cloud regions and OCI services – providing customers with potentially one of the best options anywhere in the world.

Specifically architected to help meet the needs of the enterprise, Oracle Cloud is a next-generation cloud that delivers powerful compute and networking performance and a comprehensive portfolio of infrastructure and platform cloud services from application development and business analytics to data management, integration, security, artificial intelligence (AI), and blockchain. With unique architecture and capabilities, Oracle Cloud delivers unmatched security, performance, and cost savings. Oracle Cloud is the only cloud built to run Oracle Autonomous Database, the industry’s first and only self-driving database.

www.teraco.co.za

[South Africa] Teraco completes its Cape Town hyperscale data centre campus expansion

Teraco Data Environments Proprietary Limited, Africa’s largest vendor-neutral data centre and interconnection services provider, has announced the completion of Phase 1 of CT2, its new hyperscale data centre in Brackenfell, Cape Town – the largest data centre in the Western Cape. The new facility supports the growing demand by enterprises and cloud providers for data centre capacity. CT2 offers highly resilient and secure colocation facilities in line with Teraco’s long-term vision of enabling digital transformation across Africa.

Cape Town, as one of Africa’s most digitally connected cities, is a logical destination for Teraco’s continued investment into data centre infrastructure on the continent. Home to thriving digitally connected enterprises including telecommunications, financial services, e-commerce, logistics, and retail; Cape Town benefits from its enviable location at the southern tip of Africa, and the landing of many major subsea cable systems such as ACE, WACS, SAT-3 and SAFE. The abundance of subsea cable connectivity is set to continue with Google’s Equiano and the 2AFRICA cable system developments.

CT2 represents a strategic addition to Platform Teraco, offering enterprises a scalable platform for IT infrastructure deployment while sustaining performance, reliability, security, and the most comprehensive network choice. The first phase of CT2 comprises 25000sqm of building structure, 8000sqm of data hall space, and 18MW of critical power load. Teraco has secured adjacent land and power for future expansion and brings the total critical power load to 36MW at end state.

As part of Teraco’s broader Cape Town campus, both the CT1 and CT2 data centres provide enterprises with direct access to Platform Teraco; a rich ecosystem of over 250 network providers, global cloud on-ramps, subsea cable systems, access to over 50 managed service providers, and direct peering at NAPAfrica, Africa’s largest Internet exchange point. Clients deployed in either of these facilities can connect to AWS Direct Connect and Microsoft Azure ExpressRoute directly or via Teraco’s Africa Cloud Exchange.

This multi-billion-rand data centre facility dramatically extends Platform Teraco’s capacity in the Western Cape, according to Jan Hnizdo, CEO, Teraco: “Forming a vital part of the African IT landscape, Platform Teraco is an essential part of the modern enterprise’s digital transformation strategy with its diverse industry ecosystems and open interconnection marketplace.” CT2 is connected to all the other Teraco data centres through the diverse ecosystem of network operators in the facility, making it ideal for the distributed interconnection defined architecture of the modern enterprise.

Platform Teraco provides the lowest latency interconnection points to both cloud and content. With a direct private connection to all leading cloud providers, enterprises can deploy in the most latency efficient, secure and resilient manner possible. Enterprises use Teraco to scale their IT infrastructure, adopt hybrid and multi-cloud architectures and interconnect with strategic business partners within the Teraco ecosystem.

Since its inception in 2008, Teraco has focused on building highly resilient vendor-neutral data centres. “Over the last few years, we have taken our ever-expanding ecosystems and network-dense interconnection hubs, and moved beyond simple colocation. Teraco is the enterprise infrastructure platform for growth and innovation,” concludes Hnizdo.

www.teraco.co.za

[South Africa] Teraco welcomes VMware cloud

Teraco has announced that VMware Cloud is now available via VMWare Cloud Verified service providers in the Cape Town (CT1) and Johannesburg (JB1) data centre facilities. VMware Cloud provides the fastest and easiest way to migrate existing enterprise application workloads to the cloud. When you see the VMware Cloud Verified logo, you’ll know you can easily access the full set of capabilities of VMware’s Cloud Infrastructure.

Jan Hnizdo, CEO, Teraco, says that this collaboration will further expand business opportunities for clients already present within Teraco’s data centre facilities as they adopt a cloud-first approach for their existing and next-generation applications.

“With VMware Cloud now available within Teraco, enterprises can take advantage of private and secure multi-cloud connectivity, and quickly deploy hybrid cloud infrastructures. The premise of Teraco’s vendor neutral data centre offering is to serve local and global markets at the digital edge and through channels critical to the connected world we live in. VMware, as one of the world’s leading cloud providers, assists us in making our offering richer.”

Hnizdo says that through the Teraco cloud services ecosystem, the addition of VMware Cloud will further enhance the ability of service providers to deliver more innovative cloud strategies, ultimately delivering better business value and experience to clients.

“The choice of Teraco’s digital infrastructure platform is critical for the enterprise when transforming and embracing digitalisation. It must enable scale, performance and security and assist in building digital architecture that provides resilient data centre services,” explains Hnizdo.

Together with Teraco, VMware’s expanded portfolio will enable service providers to deliver new cloud services for differentiation and, in turn, potential revenue growth, and create clouds that are developer ready and support modern applications.

Dave Funnell, Senior Manager Cloud Business at VMware, sub-Saharan Africa, says that VMWare is now being viewed as the ‘Switzerland of Cloud’ as it partners with the six major hyper-scalers as well as over 4,000 local cloud providers: “VMware’s goal is to continue being a strategic partner to our clients as they transform their business via accelerated application delivery. It encompasses providing the fastest and easiest way to migrate to the cloud, along with a platform for the management of the hybrid-multi cloud world that provides for both existing application environments, built on virtual machines, as well as the next generation built on containers. We provide freedom and choice to our clients as they adopt cloud, with the VMware Cloud Verified status providing confidence in the cloud provider they engage with.”

VMware Cloud within Teraco’s vendor neutral data centre facilities further supports the ambition to reach and assist the enterprise sector in developing and implementing successful cloud strategies: “We are excited to form part of the Teraco cloud ecosystem as we assist our clients in implementing their cloud journey” says Funnell.

www.teraco.co.za

[South Africa] CMC Networks solve African cross-border cloud connectivity issues

CMC Networks, a global telecommunications carrier, says Teraco’s Africa Cloud Exchange will play an important role in its recently launched Multi Cloud Connect solution.

CMC Networks, a global telecommunications carrier, says Teraco’s Africa Cloud Exchange will play an important role in its recently launched Multi Cloud Connect solution. This will enable its customers direct connection to AWS Direct Connect and Microsoft Azure Express Route cloud platforms across multiple countries in Africa.

Marisa Trisolino, CEO, CMC Networks, says that as the largest Pan-African provider of connectivity, the collaboration with Teraco is crucial to Multi Cloud Connects success: “By providing the essential building blocks, the Africa Cloud Exchange greatly assists us to provide our customers with the most direct and best possible cloud experience across the continent with stringent service levels to suit.”

Multi Cloud Connect will enable much sought-after connectivity for African countries trying to connect to cloud regions located in South Africa: “This is a significant offering that enables African ISP’s and carriers to connect directly without having to route to Europe and back to Africa. Leveraging CMC’s extensive African footprint Multi Cloud Connect will also drastically reduce latency through the African Cloud Exchange,” says Trisolino.

Having first engaged with Teraco over ten years ago through its carrier neutral data centre offering and NAPAfrica, Africa’s largest Internet eXchange point, Trisolino says CMC Networks has offered hosting services and peering diversity to a multitude of its customers.

The acceleration of cloud adoption, she says, spurred the company on to develop a cloud offering utilising its existing relationships: “We believe the nature of the Africa Cloud Exchange will encourage and lead to increased cloud innovation. It is an outstanding platform and will support us to achieve our strategic cloud objective, which centres on solving cross-border cloud connectivity problems throughout Africa.”

Andrew Owens, Teraco peering and interconnection specialist, says that Africa Cloud Exchange improves hybrid and multi-cloud performance through direct interconnection: “We empower our carrier communities to do more in the cloud by providing secure, direct, flexible network connections to a wide range of local and global cloud service providers.” By using an interconnected network architecture approach, Owens says that Africa Cloud Exchange will improve cloud application performance, reduce latency, scale on demand, lower network costs, and visibly deliver a better cloud experience to end users.

Trisolino is excited about the burgeoning cloud prospects across Africa. Having established itself close to 30 years ago, CMC Networks built and manages the most extensive network across Africa with 80+ Points of Presence servicing 51 African countries and in excess of 108 Points of Presence globally across USA, Europe, UAE, India, Asia, and Australia.

“The cloud era is a very exciting one for us. With our significant Africa network, Cloud Connect will undoubtedly play a vital role in the growth and improvement of cloud adoption across the African continent,” says Trisolino.

Countries that can expect sub 100ms RTD include Angola, Benin, Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.