MUMBAI, India — A new report from the global property consultancy, Knight Frank, has said that Mumbai added 56 megawatts of supply in the first quarter of 2021 to clock the sharpest increase in data center capacity across the Asia Pacific region.
The financial capital’s total supply is at 753 megawatts, as per Knight Frank’s latest report published in partnership with leading data center research and analytics platform DC Byte.
The report cited that EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa) markets have seen a rise of 4 percent in uptake in the first quarter of 2021 to 120 megawatts with a 10 percent increase in new supply overall totaling to more than 180 megawatts.
“Over the past 15 months, the pandemic has highlighted to all business types the importance of robust IT infrastructure,” Knight Frank said.
“Local and national lockdowns have forced an unprecedented upturn in demand for digital services to maintain some sort of business operation and in some cases ensure business survival.”
In Asia Pacific markets, total supply increased by about 200 megawatts in the first quarter of 2021, reflecting a similar pace to 2020 takes up — recorded just over 800 megawatts, making a total supply of 5800 megawatts across the region.
Mumbai registered the sharpest increase in supply. Pandemic influenced push for digital services resulted in an acceleration of new supply in 2020 with an additional 252 megawatts or 50 percent added to its development pipeline.
“Expansion in other Tier II markets in India, notably Chennai, are also gaining the attention of WebWerks as well as AdaniConneX (a joint venture of Adani Group and US-based EdgeConneX),” the Knight Frank said.
This marked up the total supply to 697 megawatts in the year 2020. Between 2016 and 2019, Mumbai’s IT power capacity increased from 148 megawatts to 456 megawatts.
The first-quarter report 2021, which provides comprehensive coverage of 28 key markets, tracked the significant pandemic-driven data usage shift in 2020.
This year the data said it is apparent that while some markets have kept up with this pace, others, mostly tier 2 cities, have reported little supply growth in early 2021.
Mumbai is among the better-established data center hubs in the Asia — Pacific region. The city’s location has strategic importance as a landing destination for undersea data cables connecting the east and west, said Shishir Baijal, Chairman and Managing Director at Knight Frank India.
“The presence of established telecom industry in India and the push for digital services during the pandemic has further fueled the growth of data centers in Mumbai,” said Baijal.
“The rise of emerging markets in Asia—Pacific has brought Mumbai under the focus of multiple international operators who wish to establish themselves in this region.”
(With inputs from ANI)
Edited by Abinaya Vijayaraghavan and Praveen Pramod Tewari
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