Saudi Arabia’s STC continues Phase 3 of data centre project across the region

After completing Phases 1 and 2, Saudi Arabia’s STC is continuing its data centre project Phase 3, which will be the largest data centre construction in the region at one time.

STC era data centre construction programme consists of 16 data centres with 17,000 racks incorporating eight parallel projects distributed across multiple zones within six cities.

The programme will create critical digital availability zones that will provide a full range of services, security and service management and safety measures of assets across key cities such as Riyadh, Jeddah, and Dammam.

STC is building new data centres that incorporate a smart modular design, are fully hyper-scaler compliant and deliver highly resilient infrastructure availability. On top of the design and construction excellence, the latest connectivity technologies are used to assure resilient and smooth traffic flow between different technical facilities and maintain business continuity. The data centres are part of STC’s overall strategy to provide enhanced digital and telecommunication services across all major cities in the kingdom. The construction programme for six sites is now underway, with Phase 3 expected to be completed in 12 months, with a total IT compute power capacity of 125 MW and a broader ambition for future growth in only eight months, with Phase 1 completed in 2019 and Phase 2 in the final stage of commissioning.

Haithem Alfaraj, STC chief technology officer, stated: “STC is geared up to grow-on-demand with its unique data centre solution, by easily replicating a standardised design, that could exceed 300MW of our current computing power capacity by reacting quickly to the market”.

Mohammed Alabbadi, STC chief wholesale officer, stated: “These data centres are vital components of our premier digital hub offering that stc announced towards the end of 2020. Aligned with the Saudi Vision 2030 goals, it enables Saudi as a centre of digitalisation, attracting local and foreign direct investments. Digital hub will be available, as a one-stop-shop experience, to all customer segments including local, regional and global, in a carrier-neutral environment. Enabling a locally hosted eco-system of hyper-scalers, cloud, content, and enterprises, providing the best customer experience. We envision future growth driven by evolution to cloud 4.0 and subsequently to Industry 4.0”.

Meanwhile, earlier this month, NEOM Tech & Digital Holding Company – the first holding company to be established as a subsidiary of NEOM – announced Oracle as the first tenant of its hyperscale data centre.

Read: Oracle signed on as first tenant of hyperscale data centre in Saudi Arabia’s NEOM

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) will be hosted at the data centre, providing a high-performing, resilient foundation for cloud services.