Dialog invests Rs.262mn in JV with Orion City to build data centre

From left: Orion City CEO and Digital Reality MD Jeewan Gnanam, Orion City Chairman A. S. G. Gnanam, Dialog Axiata PLC Group CEO Supun Weerasinghe and Dialog Enterprise Group Chief Officer Jeremy Huxtable 

Dialog Axiata PLC yesterday said it would invest Rs.262.5 million to establish, operate and manage a data centre, which they are hoping to develop with St. Anthony’s Property Developers (Pvt.) Ltd.

A stock market filing said Dialog Broadband Networks (Pvt.) Ltd. (DBN), a fully owned subsidiary of Dialog Axiata PLC and St. Anthony’s Property Developers (Pvt.) Ltd. (SAPD), a subsidiary of Orion City entered into a joint venture agreement in this regard. 

The data centre, which is scheduled to be completed over the next 6-9 months, will be developed at the Orion City Park in Dematagoda, Colombo 09.
The filing further said DBN will hold 35 percent of the equity of the project company—Digital Reality (Pvt.) Ltd.—and SAPD will hold the remaining 65 percent stake.
A media statement said this is Sri Lanka’s first ever high-density data centre.

“The 200 rack high density data centre is designed to offer world-class services to support the rapidly escalating demand for computing power in an increasingly digital Sri Lankan economy,” it added.

The statement also said each data rack would be individually monitored for power delivery and consumption in order to ensure that clients only pay for what they use, enabling unmatched returns on their digital investments.

The existing tenants at Orion City are also set to benefit from the enhanced processing capabilities present on site including the addition of plug and play cloud services for the facility. 

Orion City CEO Jeevan Gnanam will function as the Managing Director of Digital Realty (Pvt.) Ltd.