The data centre market, or data processing centres, is set to be the next big investment focus for the coming years in Spain, where it is expected to move 3,000 million euros over the next five years. The constant digitalisation of processes related to economic activity and the need to support it with these centres has sparked the interest of investors, who are already looking for locations outside the classic areas, Madrid and Barcelona.
In this sense, the provinces of Alicante and Valencia are positioned as the target for these investments. The reasons are the recent growth of the submarine cable network on the Mediterranean coast, the level of costs combined with the quality of life in the Valencian Community, and the commitment to digitalisation of the Generalitat, which has built the necessary base for a sector that requires a high level of specialisation.
In this regard, it is worth remembering that Distrito Digital, the Generalitat’s project to promote the change in the production model towards digitalisation, commissioned the engineering consultancy firm Antakia, which specialises in designing data centres, to draw up a report with possible locations for a centre of these characteristics in the province, just before the first state of alarm of 2020 was declared. The Digital District is particularly interested in the installation of a data centre in the province to serve technology companies, considering that this infrastructure would play a crucial role in the consolidation and growth of the area.
Previously, the IT division of El Corte Inglés, Iecisa (now owned by the French group Gfi) was interested in the province as a possible location for one of these centres. However, this interest has not materialised so far. Similarly, Amazon is looking for sites for its centres, and it is worth remembering that it is building a new logistics platform in the capital of Alicante.
Data centres are a crucial part of the digital transformation, as they store all the information that companies digitise. Currently, Level 4 centres are being built, which must be operational 99.99% of the time, which means that they are only disconnected for 26 minutes a year. For this reason, it is essential to identify the best location, requiring alternative power supplies, complementary fibre networks to the main ones, and different exchanges to connect to. In addition, the servers and all equipment in the centre must have a powerful cooling system.
