Lagos-based data center service provider, MainOne, has commenced operations in neighboring Ghana, taking its MDXi brand to the West African nation in line with its ongoing expansion plans in the region.
A statement from the firm said its new data center facility, which will be based in Appolonia City, a mixed use development 20 kilometers from the center of Accra, is expected to be ready for service in the fourth quarter of 2020 and will cater to the ever-increasing demand for colocation and interconnection services for multinationals and local businesses seeking shared services facilities for their ICT resources in world class facilities.
The Tier III facility will be constructed on 4,047 sqm land area in Appolonia City, a fast-growing light industrial park, located within the northern suburbs of Greater Accra metropolitan Area. The facility will be designed to international standards consistent with the MainOne brand, assuring collocated customers of the highest quality of service to meet their business requirements.
The 100-rack facility will offer customers the opportunity to host infrastructure in a facility guaranteed to provide high levels of availability and rich connectivity with a global network of customers, partners and suppliers thus ensuring 24X7 online delivery of services for the businesses.
MDXi’s world-class infrastructure will feature private data center suites, enterprise-grade 24×7 multi-level security and video surveillance, precision cooling, safety and fire suppression systems with multiple redundancies built into the power, cooling and security infrastructure.
In line with its parent company’s leadership in the telecoms sector, the facility will offer open access connectivity options to all the leading telecom networks in Ghana and direct access to MainOne and other submarine cable systems.
The facility will offer access to various Internet Exchanges including the GIX (Ghana), IXPN (Nigeria), LINX (London), DECIX (Frankfurt/Lisbon), and Cote d’Ivoire Internet Exchange (CIVIX), as well as the West Africa Internet Exchange (WAF-IX).
“As an organization committed to providing broadband infrastructure solutions across West Africa, we are excited to make this investment to support the digitization journey of our customers with the new data center facility” stated Kazeem Oladepo, Regional Executive, MainOne. “Over the past few years, we have grown our business in Ghana to serve major enterprises and we are delighted to bring our world-class data center expertise to deepen the Ghanaian market. The Ghanaian economy continues to build industrial capacity to show strong economic growth and we need to deploy our best solutions to service the market”
MDXi’s Tier III data centre in Lekki, Lagos-Nigeria, is the largest purpose-built commercial data center in West Africa, designed with a strong focus on high availability, security, and open access connectivity. It is certified to ISO9001, ISO27001, PCI-DSS and Uptime’s Tier III Certification of Constructed Facility standards.
With 600 rack capacity, the data center provides services to a large customer base made up of local and multinational businesses. The facility has experienced tremendous growth in the Financial and Oil & Gas sectors where it has helped advance the digitization efforts of customers and the lessons learned are viewed of particular relevance to these growing sectors in Ghana.
Speaking on the planned expansion, Gbenga Adegbiji, Director, MDXi stated, “Based on our strong track record as the preferred commercial data center in West Africa, it is with great pleasure that we announce the expansion of our MDXi footprint in Ghana. This expansion will see MDXi contributing to the growth of the local economy by providing jobs, enhancing capacity development and economic growth. Most importantly, it ensures that we are fully equipped and positioned to serve more businesses in Ghana as the region continues to grow its digital economy.”
Regarding the impact the expansion will have on the city, Bright Owosu-Amofah, CEO Appolonia City, stated that, “The city’s innovative vision to drive industrialization and social infrastructure has been made possible through partnerships like MainOne and its subsidiary company MDXi, whose data centre infrastructure will play a major role towards the economic growth and viability of Appolonia City, and also be the backbone for a connected ICT ecosystem. We look forward to witnessing the future of Appolonia City businesses being locally hosted and digitally empowered.”
Modupe Gbadeyanka 
Adedapo Adesanya 
Business Post Contributor