Digital infrastructure company Equinix is claiming that its third data centre in Rio de Janeiro state, RJ3, is the largest investment ever made by the sector in the Brazilian state. It is said to have an initial budget of US$94 million.
According to the BNamericas news service, RJ3 was announced in May last year, and was expected to go into operation in the first quarter of next year, a schedule that has now been extended to the first half of next year. RJ3 will have 560 racks and 1,467 square metres of colocation space in its first phase.
Equinix says that all of its core digital and interconnection services will be available to customers from the start of operations, including Equinix Fabric and Equinix Fabric Cloud Router, both of which provide direct interconnection with cloud providers such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud, as well as easy access to several other network and security services offered by partners.
The data centre will be close to the Via Dutra highway, providing access to optical fibre that connects Rio de Janeiro to São Paulo along the highway, with redundant connections between the two state capitals. The company says that all three of its data centre sites will be connected to each other. In addition, eight submarine cables connect to the state. The region is also supplied by two power substations.
Equinix also says that RJ3 is to adopt 'Cool Array' cooling technology, which consists of more efficient refrigeration systems, and that it will be supplied with 100% renewable energy from wind and solar sources through certified suppliers.
