ZURICH, Nov. 25, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --Interxion: A Digital Realty Company (NYSE: DLR) and a leading European provider of carrier- and cloud-neutral colocation data centre solutions, announced today it has begun construction on a major expansion project in Zurich. The new facility will be developed in three phases and is expected to support the delivery of over 11,000 square metres of total equipped space and 24 megawatts of customer capacity when fully built out. The first phase is expected to provide approximately 2,900 square metres and is scheduled to open by mid-year 2022.
The expansion is adjacent to the existing ZUR1 and ZUR2 facilities on the Interxion Zurich Campus, the leading cloud and interconnection hub in Switzerland. The new development project will benefit from the same high levels of network connectivity available at the existing data centres on the Zurich campus, and represents a strategic expansion of PlatformDIGITAL® in Switzerland. Customers can deploy their critical infrastructure in a thriving community of connectivity providers, platforms and enterprises that has been cultivated over the past 20 years, and will also be able to leverage Digital Realty's global platform spanning 24 countries across six continents.
"Our Zurich expansion marks an important milestone on our global platform roadmap and demonstrates our commitment to supporting customers' digital transformation strategies and enabling their future growth on PlatformDIGITAL®," said Digital Realty Chief Executive Officer A. William Stein. "This growth reflects the demand we're seeing in Zurich and across Europe, as the continent plays a prominent and growing role as an enterprise data superpower."
ZUR3 is expected be part of the new sustainable district heating project in the municipalities of Opfikon and Rümlang, using heat generated by the data centre to warm local households. The data centre is expected to contribute significant excess heat to the local district's heating project in the EnergieVerbund Airport City region of Zurich. This initiative supports Digital Realty's commitment to join the science-based targets initiative for climate reduction announced earlier this year.
"The expansion of our Zurich campus enables Interxion to offer Swiss and international companies the highly connected data centre capacity they need as they roll out their hybrid IT infrastructure by combining leading cloud services, global connectivity and Interxion's colocation solutions," said Hans Jörg Denzler, Switzerland Managing Director, Interxion: A Digital Realty Company. "We are pleased to support local and global service providers with additional data centre capacity to seamlessly expand their services in the region via PlatformDIGITAL®."
Data Gravity intensity for the EMEA region is expected to more than double each year by 2024 and is projected to grow at a faster rate than either North America or Asia Pacific, according to Digital Realty's recently published Data Gravity Index DGx™, a global forecast that measures the intensity and gravitational force of enterprise data growth for metros across the world.1 Digital Realty recently announced plans to significantly extend the geographic scope of the Data Gravity Index to cover more than 50 global metros and over 20 distinct industries.
"We continue to experience solid demand across our pan-European footprint," said David Ruberg, Chief Executive, EMEA. "Zurich is a strategic digital hub and provides an ideal location for customers to consolidate their digital infrastructure and overcome the growth challenges posed by data gravity. ZUR3 meets the requirements of both our local and global multinational enterprise customers, providing access to dense network connectivity, available power and interconnectivity with other strategic European locations, and will keep us at the forefront of the opportunity in Switzerland."
