India's data centre industry worth USD 5.6 bn; set to grow further: Report

New Delhi: India's data centre industry size is worth USD 5.6 billion and is set to grow as over 45 data centres are expected to come up by 2025, according to Anarock and Binswanger report.

At present, there are 138 data centres across India spanning about 11 million square feet and having 737 MW of IT capacity (building ready). At least 57 per cent of this current IT capacity is in Mumbai and Chennai, collectively.

As per the latest Anarock and Binswanger report 'Under the Lens: India's Data Centre Explosion', over 45 data centres spanning about 13 million square feet and 1,015 MW of IT capacity are planned to come up in India by 2025-end on rising demand amid the Covid pandemic.

In terms of IT capacity (nearly 1,015 MW), over 69 per cent of this planned new supply will come up in Mumbai and Chennai.

With the addition of this new planned supply, the country will have 183 data centres with about 24 million square feet and at least 1,752 MW of total IT capacity.

"India is at the cusp of a data centre evolution," the consultants said.

Once a small, fragmented industry, co-location data centres are fast transitioning into a large, potentially consolidated industry, it added.

Devi Shankar, President - Industrial & Logistics and Data Centres at Anarock Capital, said: "The current size of the India data centre industry is about USD 5.6 billion and is bound to grow." The unprecedented crisis created by the Covid-19 outbreak has propelled the data centre business forward, providing an unexpected tailwind.

"Technology adoption and digitisation across the sectors were fast-tracked globally and India also leap-frogged at least a decade in the last couple of years. The country's total estimated data centre demand is expected to be 2,100 MW as of FY2025, with a mix between hyperscalers and enterprises – 35:65 (excluding self-owned hyperscaler capacity)," Shankar said.

The report further said that there is an additional potential of nearly 2,688 MW of future unplanned supply in India. Land for this supply has been locked in by data centre operators, but the projects will likely be planned based on actual demand and/or outcome of earlier planned phases.

Jeff Binwanger, Managing Partner at Binswanger, said, "Companies are really starting to relook where they are putting their operations globally, where they would like to relocate and where do they want to manufacture, distribute and set up their database and technology facilities. Data centres are currently a fulcrum for a lot of the decision-making, especially in Asia Pacific and in India." The report also highlighted the survey conducted amongst IT professionals in India to analyse trends in the Indian data centre industry, as perceived by professionals who manage data-related infrastructure within their organisations.

The survey was targeted at data managers from diverse industries and company sizes.

"30 per cent of companies are looking at hybrid (cloud + data centre) hosting services for data management. IT Infrastructure monitoring, assessment and design are top services that IT professionals are keen to outsource," the consultants said.

As per the survey, top priorities of IT professionals are to bring in operational efficiencies and cost savings to their data centres, data compression and improving power usage effectiveness, and technology improvements.

"58 per cent of IT professionals feel co-location is better than captive data centres. 72 per cent of professionals have witnessed data surges in their organisations post-Covid-19. 64 per cent of organisations are looking to power their data centres by more than 60 per cent clean power in the next 2 years," the report said.

As many as 67 per cent of professionals find it challenging to recruit and retain quality talent in the IT domain.