Exa Infrastructure has invested €39 million ($42.5m) in digital infrastructure for the Iberian Peninsula, Spain, since the company launched in 2021.
The investment has been used to upgrade 100km of metro network in Barcelona, connecting several data centers, including those hosted by Interxion, Equinix, Edged Energy, and EdgeConnex, with the AFR-IX Telecom Barcelona Cable Landing Station.
The company is looking to expand its footprint in the country due to its strategic location between Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and Europe.
Exa Infrastructure VP Network Investment, Steve Roberts, said: “Exa’s investment plans are strategically driven to support the growth of our customers, the industry, and for the local economy. Barcelona is increasingly becoming a hot spot of subsea and data center activity, and is ideally located to serve our customers’ requirements for resilient connectivity to other data centers and cable landing stations across the Iberian Peninsula.”
The company currently owns and operates 114,000 kilometers of fiber networks across 34 countries, and last year announced plans for a new 600km network link between Barcelona, Zaragoza, and Bilbao to link data center clusters between the cities.
The $42.5m investment will also see a new terrestrial transport route set between Lisbon and Sines in Portugal to Exa’s Spain backbone in Madrid and Barcelona.
“The exponential growth we are seeing across the Iberian Peninsula is driving greater economic growth and investment in and around Barcelona. We are extremely proud of the investment Exa Infrastructure is making in this region and the growth that will continue in years to come,” said Miguel Ángel Acero, chief technology officer, and co-founder at AFR-IX.
The Barcelona Cable Landing Station will be home to the AFR-IX ‘Medusa’ submarine cable, an 8,760 km cable planned to connect the Middle East and Europe set to be deployed by Q3 of 2024.
The landing station is currently home to two cables, including the 2Africa cable that was received in October 2022. The landing station also offers 380 sqm (4,100 sq ft) of colocation space and two meet-me rooms. The building is constructed to Tier IV standards and features on-site solar panels.
Barcelona has seen significant investment in the last 12 months. Equinix announced earlier this year that it was planning a second Barcelona data center, and Vapor IO is expanding its Edge service to the legion. In September 2022, AQ Compute announced that was planning a 50MW data center in the region.