ALREADY PLANNING FURTHER EXPANSION

Australia-based data center services provider, NEXTDC, has announced that it is partnering with the Northern Territory Government of Australia (NTG) to develop a new data center in Darwin.

Based on this partnership, the new NEXTDC’s data center is expected to underpin the digital territory strategy of NTG and drive the economic development of the region’s technology capabilities.

Codenamed D1, the planned facility is precisely located at 2 Harvey Street in Darwin’s central business district, positioned next to an electricity substation as well as the Charles Darwin University Campus.

“NEXTDC’s commitment to supporting the Northern Territory’s goal of becoming a key destination for digital growth extends beyond our initial D1 development,” said Craig Scroggie, Chief Executive Officer of NEXTDC.

“We have also secured the rights for an additional and significant land parcel for our second Darwin site (D2). This site is in excess of 15 hectares and will provide additional capacity for the long-term development of a hyperscale campus designed to serve the emerging Asia South region connected to Darwin by new international submarine cable networks.”

Subject to development approval, D1 is designed to deliver up to 8MW of IT load capacity and provide access to cloud platforms including AWS, Google Cloud, Microsoft, IBM Cloud, Oracle Cloud and Alibaba, along with the country’s carrier networks and service provider partners via the AXON interconnection platform.

“This investment will help us diversify and strengthen the Territory economy. Not only will it create jobs for Territory tradies during construction, but the innovation center will spur the growth of tech businesses here in the Territory and create digital careers for locals,” said Michael Gunner, Chief Minister of the Northern Territory.

“NEXTDC’s investment cements Darwin as Northern Australia’s most advanced digital economy, and this will open the door to new opportunities for future investment in cloud-based computing services and advanced manufacturing. We are Australia’s comeback capital, but we also want to be Australia’s destination for all things digital.”

As announced, Vocus is the D1’s anchor tenant, and will host its new services and associated infrastructure in the data center. Vocus is also expected to provide high-capacity connectivity to D1 on its Terabit Territory fiber network.

Recently, NEXTDC also announced it plans to develop a new data center in Adelaide, South Australia with a planned investment of $100 million.