What do you believe is the single most important factor driving up the cost of living in Nigeria?

Data centres, crucial for digital transformation, are large facilities that house servers and computer equipment to process, store, and distribute data and applications over the Internet.

The Chief Executive Officer of Digital Realty Nigeria, Ikechukwu Nnamani, said that approximately 90 per cent of the investment required to build a new data centre relies on imported infrastructure, making the sector highly vulnerable to exchange rate fluctuations.

“If you benchmark your costs in dollars and convert to naira, a depreciation of the naira can reduce your revenue by up to 40 per cent,” Nnamani said at the Hyperscalers Convergence Africa conference in Lagos.

“A very small portion of the expenses are in local currency unless you’re building outside of Africa,” he added.

Overall, Nigeria is currently experiencing a severe economic crisis, primarily due to the devaluation of the naira against the dollar, which has dropped significantly since President Bola Tinubu’s monetary reforms began in May 2023.

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