It has been a long wait. When President William Ruto stood next to Oracle executives in early 2024 to announce a public cloud region for Kenya, the timeline was vague. But today, the blueprint is final: Oracle is planting its flag at iXAfrica Data Centres.
On paper, this looks like standard corporate procurement. In reality, it is a calculated bet on the future of high-performance computing in East Africa. By choosing iXAfrica—a facility explicitly designed for the brutal power demands of artificial intelligence—Oracle is signaling that its Nairobi region won’t just be a place to store government records. It is going to be an engine for AI.
The “AI-Ready” Moat
To understand why Oracle likely picked iXAfrica over established rivals like Africa Data Centres (ADC), you have to look at the thermodynamics.
Legacy data centres in Nairobi were built for the pre-AI internet. They are designed to cool racks of servers that consume about 4kW to 8kW of power. This is fine for hosting websites or bank ledgers.
But modern AI workloads—specifically those running on clusters of NVIDIA or Blackwell GPUs—are entirely different beasts. They run incredibly hot. A single rack of these chips can demand 30kW to 50kW of power.
The “Pizza Oven” Analogy:
Putting a 50kW AI server rack into a standard 4kW data centre is like putting an industrial pizza oven into a residential kitchen. You will either blow the fuse immediately, or the room will get so hot the equipment melts.
iXAfrica’s campus claims to handle 50kW per rack using “free-air cooling” technology. This allows Oracle to deploy high-density infrastructure immediately without waiting for a custom build-to-suit facility. In the race for cloud dominance against AWS and Google, speed is the only metric that counts.
The Specs: By the Numbers
| Feature | The “Old” Standard | The iXAfrica Spec | Why it matters |
| Density | 4–8 kW per rack | 50 kW per rack | Essential for AI & GPU clusters. |
| Cooling | CRAC (A/C Units) | Free-Air / High Efficiency | Lowers the “PUE” (Power Usage Effectiveness) score. |
| Power Source | Grid + Diesel | 90% Renewable Grid | Critical for Oracle’s ESG (Environmental) goals. |
Why “Sovereignty” is the Killer App
Beyond the hardware, this move solves a massive legal headache for Kenyan enterprises: Data Sovereignty.
For years, Kenyan banks and government agencies were stuck in limbo. They wanted to use Oracle’s powerful cloud tools, but the Data Protection Act often requires sensitive citizen data to stay within Kenya’s borders. If the closest Oracle server is in South Africa or London, you can’t use it.
By physically locating the servers in Nairobi, that legal barrier vanishes.
- Latency: Ping times drop from ~150ms (Nairobi to London) to <10ms (Nairobi to Mombasa Road).
- Compliance: Data never leaves the country, satisfying the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) and other regulators.
The Competitive Landscape
Oracle isn’t the only giant in town. Microsoft has been making noise with its geothermal plans in partnership with G42, and Google arrived in Nairobi years ago.
However, the “Carrier Neutral” status of iXAfrica is vital here. Unlike a facility owned by a specific telecom operator (where you might pay a premium to use a competitor’s fibre), a carrier-neutral facility is the “Switzerland” of the internet. Safaricom, Airtel, Jamii, and Wananchi can all plug in their fibre cables freely. This creates a dense “meet-me room” where connectivity is cheap and redundant.
The Verdict
The press release describes iXAfrica as the “only” facility ready for this. While competitors would dispute that, the 50kW density figure is the trump card. Until other facilities retrofit their cooling halls to handle that kind of heat, iXAfrica has a distinct, if temporary, advantage.
Oracle’s cloud is no longer just a “plan” on a government memo. It has a physical address, and it is ready to run hot.
