Real estate developer Attacq and Vantage Data Centres have partnered in a 50:50 joint venture to build a data center in Johannesburg, South Africa.
The project forms the first half of Phase II of Vantage’s South Africa data center in Waterfall City, as reported by TechFinancials.
Spanning 10,363 sqm (111,546 sq ft), the two-story facility will feature four data halls. Construction is underway with completion expected by Q1 2026.
The investment for the data center shell is estimated at R628 million ($34m), backed by a 20-year lease. Attacq is expected to partner on the shell only.
Spanning 30 acres, the JNB1 campus comprises three facilities across 60,000 sqm (650,000 sq ft) and will offer 80MW of IT capacity at full buildout. The first 16MW facility - dubbed JNB11 - was completed in 2022 and was delivered using prefabricated electrical containers and equipment.
Plans for the campus were first announced in October 2021.
At the time, Antoine Boniface, president of Vantage EMEA, said: “Johannesburg is the data center hub for sub‐Saharan Africa due to its strategic location, IT ecosystem, fiber connectivity to the rest of Africa, and the availability of renewable energy. We look forward to opening the doors of our first African facility to our customers and becoming part of the local community. Our first campus has a planned investment of more than R15-billion, and it will add jobs to impact the local economy positively.”
Attacq is the developer of the Waterfall City in Johannesburg. Other occupants of the Waterfall City hub include Pragma, Nokia, and Siemens Energy.
Other operators in Johannesburg include Digital Parks Africa, OADC, Digital Realty, Teraco, NTT, and Africa Data Centers. Equinix entered the South African market in October last year.
