Data Gravity Drives Data Center Growth in India and APAC

Mumbai is expected to have 529 MW of data capacity by 2023. Chennai will have 133 MW. These will be the two largest centers in India

Ever since 4G mobile networks were launched in India around 2016, the volume and pace of data consumption has seen unprecedented growth. Data is the new currency of India’s digital economy. For example one of the biggest users of mobile data has been the Fintech industry. According to the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), the Unified Payment Interface or UPI based payments, recorded over 6.28 billion transactions in July 2022. This is a record since the service was launched in July 2016.

There are many drivers underlying this growth in data use. For example, a major part of India is now watching streaming OTT content – movies, music, web episodes etc — video is one of the largest contributors towards the high data consumption.

And catering to this, we have seen a corresponding growth in data centers (DC) and distributed cloud computing – not just in India but across Asia. The core concept that is driving this is Data Gravity. A clear indicator of this is the increasing capacities of Data Centers across the Asia Pacific region. Typically, data center Capacity is measured in MegaWatts – which essentially indicates the total energy consumed for operating these DCs.

We have measured how the data center capacity has grown since 2019. As can be seen in the chart below, it has grown significantly over these years, primarily as the move to online accelerated with the pandemic.

Currently, the US has the most capacity at 8000 MW and is the largest in the world. China is next with approximately 3100 MW — India is lower but has grown from 530 MW in 2019 and expected to reach 1300 MW by 2024.

With huge volumes of data in peta and exabytes arising daily, the growth of Data Center Capacity across the region is also increasing.

The major DC hubs for India are Mumbai and Chennai – primarily because of a number or historical reasons, being the centers where early network and applications deployments had happened.

When you build those DCs, with very powerful CPUs and the GPUs — these then start exerting gravitational pull on other data and applications.

So it is pulling other data and applications closer to these centers. These clusters are thus becoming bigger and bigger and bigger. It is a kind of virtuous cycle for the concept of Data Gravity. The industry is building DCs closer to end customers – because of the requirements of the applications, which are both speed and latency sensitive. Though 80% of the Internet is video content, but this is not the super latency sensitive application. The biggest drivers are the latency sensitive applications like Uber, maps, location based services, and in some places use cases like self driving cars or medical applications.

As can be seen by the above, Mumbai is expected to have 529 MW of data capacity by 2023. Chennai will have 133 MW. These will be the two largest centers.

Hyderabad with 96 MW, Delhi with 89 MW and Pune with 77 MW will be the next rung. Followed by Bangalore 70 MW and Kolkatta, 20 MW.

Further, as the recent 5G auctions in India have unfolded, Enterprises applications will be another big driver. Digital transformation will contribute to more data. Smart Cities and the increasing deployment of sensors, Internet of Things (IoT) along with real time applications in medical sciences and space application, will all contribute to accelerate the DC and cloud computing infrastructure deployment.

All these bodies of data will slowly transform into bigger repositories that enable Data Gravity.

They will further attract other data and applications not different from the concept of gravity on objects around a planet.

When you build those huge DCs in specific locations, with very powerful CPUs and the GPUs — these then start exerting gravitational pull on other data and applications.

This will impact the DC locations and storage-oriented ‘data lakes’ will be closer to customers.

How does Data Gravity

Digital Realty’s Data Gravity Index report estimates that by 2024, the G2000 Enterprises across 53 metros are expected to create 1.4 million gigabytes per second, process an additional 30 petaflops and store an additional 622 terabytes per second. This will certainly amplify data gravity. Data Gravity Intensity, which is determined by data mass, level of data activity, bandwidth and, of course, latency, is expected to see a 153% CAGR in the Asia Pacific region, with certain metros having larger attraction.

All these bodies of data will slowly transform into bigger repositories that enable Data Gravity. They will further attract other data and applications not different from the concept of gravity on objects around a planet.

The red bubbles are connected with terrestrial and submarine cables.

We expect that 17 more submarine cable systems will be commissioned between 2023 and 2025 interconnecting these regions. Telecom Operators and public cloud services (like Google, AWS and Microsoft Azure) are part of these submarine networks.

With the gravitational pull exerted by these data clusters – increasing exponentially due to the increasing numbers of applications that are deployed, more such agglomerations of DCs, clusters and locations are expected.

Regulatory and operational challenges will arise due to data gravity. There will be unforeseen challenges on account of consumers, their proximity to the DCs, the amount of bandwidth required to connect all the DCs together to make the available at lower cost.

By Ryan Perera

Vice President, Asia Content & Subsea Networks, India & the subcontinent, Ciena

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