Meta to lease a 500MW AI data center in Visakhapatnam
What's the story
Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, is reportedly partnering with Sify Technologies to develop a large 500-megawatt (MW) data center in Visakhapatnam. The facility is planned for Paradesipalem village along the Kolkata-Srikakulam highway, according to The Economic Times. Once completed, it will be leased to Meta to support its AI services and global connectivity projects, including the landing of its ambitious 'Waterworth' subsea cable at Sify's local landing station.
Project details
Sify's investment and infrastructure development
Sify Technologies is said to be investing ₹15,266 crore in this hyperscale data center project. The company will develop the entire facility and all related infrastructure up to the racks. A data center typically consists of rows of racks housing graphics processing units (GPUs) and tensor processing units (TPUs), which can be hired or bought from developers such as NVIDIA.
Strategic move
Meta's AI services and subsea cable project
This is the first time Meta will lease large-scale data infrastructure in India, as part of its plan to tap into the world's largest base for AI services. Apart from leasing data-center capacity, Meta will also land its multibillion-dollar undersea cable system 'Waterworth' on the shores of Mumbai and Visakhapatnam. The 50,000km-long Waterworth will be the world's longest subsea cable system connecting US, India, Brazil, and South Africa.
Regional impact
Sify's role in Andhra Pradesh's data center ecosystem
The partnership with Meta will be one of Sify's largest customer commitments. The company is among the first to join Andhra Pradesh's plan to build a 6GW data center ecosystem. While Google will build a 1GW data center cluster, the state government has allocated 550MW for Sify. The company's first AI data center with a capacity of 50MW will come up at Madhurawada.
Emerging trend
Andhra Pradesh's growing data center hub
The Andhra Pradesh government has also signed MoUs with Reliance Industries (1GW), Tillman Global Holdings (300MW), and Anant Raj Cloud (117MW) to set up data centers. The state is emerging as a data center hub, leveraging its long coastline for undersea cable projects. A senior official from the Andhra Pradesh government said companies are looking at the east coast for such projects to tap into the Southeast Asian market.