It is the new cornerstone of Côte d'Ivoire's digital ambition: the Village des Technologies de l'Information et des Biotechnologies (VITIB). It was the setting, on Thursday 2 October 2025, for the inauguration of the first data centre of the pan-African group ST Digital in Côte d'Ivoire, a Tier III infrastructure. This event marks a significant milestone in the country's digital sovereignty strategy, aimed at reducing its dependence on foreign infrastructures for the hosting of digital data.
Anthony Same, Founder and CEO of ST DigitalThis project comes in a context where Africa accounts for only about 1% of global data center capacity, a market estimated at 386 billion dollars, generating only 3.5 billion dollars in revenue on the continent. By comparison, North America alone concentrates more than 50% of installed capacity. According to projections from the International Data Corporation (IDC), the African market could however exceed 13 billion dollars by 2030, driven by an explosion in digital usage and expected annual Internet traffic growth of 40%.
A local response to a continental deficit
The inauguration of ST Digital's 100% African cloud Data center marks a major milestone for Ivorian digital sovereigntyThe Grand-Bassam data center, built on an area of 4,000 m², represents an investment of several million dollars. It consists of three modules offering a capacity of approximately 160 racks, housing more than 6,000 physical servers and enabling the hosting of more than 50,000 virtual servers. Its design, construction, and operation have been entirely entrusted to African companies, a strong strategic choice. The company called upon Ivorian architecture firms (CATD by Thierry Dogbo and AED by Marcel Sewanou), the local technical engineering consultancy OPTIMA, and the construction company DTECH for its construction.
"This is a strong message: we want to create value locally within a value chain that is traditionally dominated by foreign players," emphasised Anthony Same, founder and CEO of ST Digital. He adds: "We are proving that it is possible, with African expertise, to design, build, and operate a data centre to international standards. Africa is not condemned to depend on major foreign operators to secure its data."
Digital sovereignty at the heart of the project
For the Ivorian authorities, this project is part of a broader national vision. Olivier Avoa, the Director General of Digital Transformation and Digitalisation, who was present at the inauguration, noted that "without local data centers, our data ends up being hosted abroad. This exposes our nations to risks of technological dependency and strategic vulnerability." He affirmed that through such infrastructure, the country "is making the choice of digital sovereignty by ensuring that Ivorian data is stored, processed and protected on our soil."
Furthermore, the Grand-Bassam site is only the first step in a regional expansion strategy. Indeed, ST Digital plans to deploy a network of interconnected data centers in Cameroun, Togo, Guinea, Senegal, and Gabon, where a new infrastructure is planned for completion by end of 2025.
Faced with competition from global cloud giants (AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud) and local telecom operators, the company intends to differentiate itself through a hybrid model. Steve Tchouaga, Managing Director of the Ivorian subsidiary, summarises their positioning as follows: "we are not seeking to copy the global giants, but to offer a credible African alternative, designed to secure strategic data while creating value locally."
With this inauguration, Côte d'Ivoire, which now has around twenty data centers (approximately 10% of the African total), concretely strengthens its ambitions to become a leading digital hub in West Africa.