The multinational data centre provider Equinix, which purchased MainOne in Nigeria, has revealed plans to construct a new data centre in Lagos for $22 million.
- The multinational data centre provider Equinix, which purchased MainOne in Nigeria, has revealed plans to construct a new data centre...
- This will be the company’s first newly built facility in West Africa.
- With the most significant number of internet users of any Nigerian state (over 18 million as of Q1 2024), Lagos...
- Equinix stated in April 2025 that it plans to invest up to $140 million to expand digital infrastructure throughout southern...
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This will be the company’s first newly built facility in West Africa.
The new data centre, known as LG3, is designed for both domestic and international enterprises seeking to expand into a nation with robust digital infrastructure. By the first quarter of 2026, it is expected to be open and operational.
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Equinix’s $100 million investment strategy in Africa, which intends to revolutionise the continent’s digital landscape over the next two years, begins with the opening of this data centre.
Why Lagos?
With the most significant number of internet users of any Nigerian state (over 18 million as of Q1 2024), Lagos is the hub of the country’s digital traffic.
The city is home to the nation’s largest concentration of telecom operators, banks, fintechs, and enterprise clients. It also boasts many subsea cable systems, which give it a competitive edge in global connectivity.
The size of the demand and the room for expansion in Lagos are demonstrated by the projections that the Nigerian data centre market will reach over $684 million by 2030, with the city accounting for more than 30 per cent of the market.
“As Lagos emerges at the crossroads of talent, innovation, and global connectivity, this facility is accelerating access to technologies like cloud, AI, and the next wave of startups,” said Wole Abu, Managing Director for West Africa at Equinix
Component of Equinix’s data centre ‘LG3’
Equinix Fabric®, a service that enables companies to link their virtual and physical infrastructure to a global network of cloud service providers across more than 270 Equinix data centres globally, will be available at the new data centre.
Equinix stated in April 2025 that it plans to invest up to $140 million to expand digital infrastructure throughout southern Nigeria, and the LG3 project is a key component of this larger investment plan.
To decentralise Nigeria’s internet capacity, the plan involves building a new data centre in Port Harcourt, PR1, which will serve as the first landing station for Meta’s 2Africa subsea cable outside of Lagos.
This is Equinix’s most recent strategic move since it formally entered the West African market in April 2022, when it purchased MainOne, an African telecom and network solutions provider, for $320 million. Through the agreement, Equinix gained access to MainOne’s assets, which included more than 1,200 kilometres of terrestrial fibre in southern Nigeria, a 7,000-kilometre submarine cable system connecting Nigeria to Portugal, and several operational data centres in Nigeria, Ghana, and Côte d’Ivoire.
Competition to seize Nigeria’s digital future
As several companies make significant investments in the industry, such as telecom behemoth MTN, which has committed more than $240 million to construct a 9-megawatt Tier 3 data centre to expand its local cloud offerings, the competition to seize Nigeria’s digital future is intensifying.
To fuel Nigeria’s AI ambitions, Airtel Nigeria is also investing $120 million in its 38-megawatt data centre, currently under construction in Lagos. To meet the demand for cloud services, Open Access Data Centres (OADC), a division of the WIOCC Group, plans to expand the capacity of its Lagos data centre to 24 megawatts by 2027.
With thousands of partners and more than 220 hyperscaler on-ramps in 45 metro areas, Equinix’s platform has over 64,000 interconnections and serves more than 4,000 customers worldwide. With the new Lagos facility, the company is now bringing this vast global platform and its wealth of interconnection opportunities to West Africa.
“With the opening of our newest data centre in Lagos, Equinix is proud to invest in this dynamic region, supporting our customers’ growth with world-class data centres that power everything from banking and education to emergency services and commerce,” Aslıhan Güreşcier, Vice President, EMEA Growth & Emerging Markets at Equinix, said.