Airtel to infuse Rs 5000 crore to expand its data center business

Bharti Airtel Limited (“Airtel”) has today unveiled a refreshed brand identity ‘Nxtra by Airtel’ for its data center business and outlined investment plans to significantly scale up its data center network to serve the requirements of India’s fast-growing digital economy.

“Nxtra by Airtel aims to be at the forefront of this growth and plans to invest Rs 5,000 crores by 2025 to further scale up its industry-leading network of hyperscale and edge data centers. This will include new data center parks in key metro cities. The investment will triple Nxtra by Airtel’s installed capacity to over 400 MW to meet the surging demand and consolidate its network leadership,” the statement said.

Commenting on the development, Ajay Chitkara, Director & CEO, Airtel Business said, “Airtel has built the largest data center network in India and we are now doubling down on this business to scale up our network that will be at the core of 5G and Digital India. Our experience of operating secure data centers, deep brand trust in the enterprise segment, and the ability to deliver end-to-end digital transformation solutions positions us well to serve the emerging requirements of India’s connected economy. The new brand identity embodies this vision and ambition.”

“Sustainability will continue to be its big focus given the huge energy requirements of data centers. Nxtra by Airtel is already aggressively scaling up the use of green energy for its data centers and aims to source 50% of the power requirements of these centers through renewable sources as part of Airtel’s overall GHG emission reduction targets. Nxtra by Airtel also recently commissioned captive solar power plants in the state of Uttar Pradesh & Maharashtra with still more in the pipeline,” it added.

Nxtra by Airtel has the largest network of data centers in India. It currently operates 10 large and 120 edge data centers located strategically across India and manages critical submarine landing stations. Coupled with Airtel’s global network, it offers a secure and scalable integrated solution to global hyper scalers, large Indian enterprises, startups, SMEs, and governments.