The University of Mannheim has started work on a new data center in Mannheim, Germany.

The university last week held a small ceremony for the new University IT Mannheim (UNIT) building on March 14.

The three-story, 5,360 sqm (57,685 sq ft) building, located in the A5 district along Bismarckstraße, will be completed by mid-2027.

“This is a particularly important moment in the history of our university,” said university president, Professor Dr. Thomas Fetzer, at the laying of the foundation stone. “The UNIT is at the heart of the university and is indispensable for teaching, research, and administration. At the same time, the new building will be a central point of the new campus, which grows together here.”

The new building is a timber construction, combined with elements of recycled concrete and a green flat roof. A 220kW photovoltaic facade is expected to generate more than 130,000 kilowatt hours annually. The facility will reuse waste heat from the data center for heating and cooling of the office and teaching facilities.

The university said it was investing around €39.5 million ($42.5m) in the project, which is part of a wider redevelopment scheme.

As part of the ceremony, a current issue of the Mannheimer Morgen newspaper, a USB stick with a review of the UNIT from 2024, a copy of the university's strategic plan, symbolic coins, and a bottle of wine were placed in a metal box, which serves as the foundation stone.

Groundworks actually began in September 2024. The university said there had already been challenges. The construction site lies partly on the remains of a former lake created in the mid-19th century, and a buried underground bunker from the Second World War posed “particular challenges” with structural engineering and the installation of underground piping.

UNIT has an existing data center on the 11th floor of a 1960s university building in the L15 district along Bismarckstraße, around 1.5km (0.93 miles) away from the new site.

Wulf Architekten is the architect firm on the project.