On 7 July 2019 iibGroup secured a license for construction and operation of a diversified ICT Park in Djibouti. The leading facility at the Park will be a 1000-rack Tier III data centre, built in stages with operations starting in late 2020. The Park will include renewable energy infrastructure to support availability at Tier III level and will benefit from high-quality local and international fibre-optic connectivity, utilising iibGroup’s proprietary fibre optic network, afrifibre, as well as submarine cables operated by Djibouti Telecom.

The data centre will provide managed ICT infrastructure to local and regional public and private sector clients; it will host data and applications for use by clients as well as their customers; and will provide back-up and rapid recovery services to ensure business continuity for its clients.

In addition, the Park will provide ICT education and training facilities, software development services, hardware installation and maintenance services, ICT consulting services, business incubation services and conferencing facilities together with onsite accommodation for visitors.

The broad ICT ecosystem at the Park is expected to generate several hundred jobs on site, more than a third of these being highly skilled positions. Over time, a much larger impact can be expected on the wider economy, in the form of transfer of technology and build-up of technical capacity in the country, incubation of ICT-related start-ups, enhanced efficiency and productivity of the Park’s client community through access to improved ICT infrastructure and an uplift in Djibouti’s profile on the international stage as an enabled destination for international business.

Construction of the Data Centre is foreseen from July 2019 with operations beginning in late 2020 at completion of a first phase with 200 racks. In subsequent months the data centre will continue to expand in parallel with implementation of other elements of the Park.