Equinix Forays South Africa, Earmarks $160M Data Center Investment

Digital infrastructure company Equinix, Inc EQIX aimed to enter the South African market with a $160 million data center investment in Johannesburg.
The investment would augment its current footprint on the African continent in Nigeria, Ghana, and Côte d'Ivoire.
The new data center will likely open in mid-2024.
Already a strategically important connectivity hub for digital networks, South Africa boasts a significant network of submarine communications cables.
Eugene Bergen, President of EMEA, said, "This investment will give both South African businesses the opportunity to expand internationally and global businesses to expand into South Africa. Both will be able to accelerate their growth by rapidly scaling their infrastructure, easily adopting hybrid multi-cloud architectures, and interconnecting with business partners through the Platform Equinix ecosystem of more than 10,000 customers."
Following the acquisition of MainOne in April 2022, Equinix has announced two expansions into ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations) following the recently announced plans to expand into Indonesia and Malaysia.
Before this, Equinix announced growth in the South American market by acquiring five Entel data centers to accelerate digital transformation opportunities for local businesses and multinational companies in Peru and Chile.
Price Action: EQIX shares traded higher by 4.39% at $710.28 on the last check Tuesday.