CtrlS completed its Hyderabad DC 3 project in May last year (Image: CtrlS)
Hyderabad-based CtrlS Data Centers has joined the growing list of developers expanding capacity around the Telangana state capital, with the company this week announcing plans to build its fourth facility in the metropolitan area.
The project, which is planned for a 40-acre (16 hectare) site in Chandanvelly Industrial Park around 50 kilometres (31 miles) southwest of Hyderabad, will be CtrlS’ 16th in India, with a potential capacity of over 600 megawatts upon full completion, according to the company.
“Telangana is rapidly emerging as an economic powerhouse in India, making it strategic for CtrlS Datacenters’ expansion,” CtrlS Datacenters chairman Sridhar Pinnapureddy said in a statement. “Our new datacenter park will catalyse the growth of data-driven and technology businesses in the region.”
CtrlS’ latest project adds to a series of digital infrastructure projects in Hyderabad, with Singapore’s ST Telemedia Global Data Centre Singapore’s ST Telemedia Global Data Centre announcing this week this week that its India joint venture will invest an estimated INR 3.5 billion ($400 million) to build a facility with a target capacity of 100 megawatts in the city.
Scaling Up
CtrlS released its latest data centre plan eight months after it completed its third Hyderabad data centre, a 13 megawatt facility which involved investment of INR 5 billion ($58 million).
CtrlS Datacenters chairman Sridhar Pinnapureddy
CtrlS said it has secured 250 megawatts of sanctioned power for the first phase of the project and plans to have a dedicated substation which could be expanded to 900 megawatts. The facility is planned to achieve a power usage effectiveness (PUE) of between 1.12 and 1.32, and will feature solar module facades on two sides.
The firm did not respond to Mingtiandi’s inquiries about the cost and timeline of the new Hyderabad project.
The Indian data centre firm currently has a capacity of 250 megawatts in operation, and describes itself as the largest Rated 4 data centre firm in Asia, indicating that its facilities conform to the highest rating for data centre reliability with an expected annual uptime of at least 99.995 percent.
In October 2023, CtrlS announced plans to invest an estimated $2 billion over six years to expand its capacity and headcount, with the firm following up with announcement of new projects across India.
A month after the October 2023 announcement, CtrlS pledged to invest INR 2.5 billion in northern India’s Uttarakhand state. This was followed by the company breaking ground on a INR 250 billion data centre in Gujarat in December of 2023, and the announcement of a plan to build a INR 40 billion campus in Chennai in February 2024. CtrlS also in 2024 announced plans to expand in the cities of Kolkata and Patna.
Emerging Digital Hub
CtrlS’s announcement of its new Hyderabad campus comes after a number of data centre developers and operators have completed projects or unveiled plans for new facilities in the Telangana capital over the last two years, including AWS, Microsoft, CapitaLand India, and domestic player Web Werks.
The metropolitan area, which hosts over 1,500 IT companies, at 52 megawatts still has a fraction of Mumbai’s 477 megawatts or Chennai’s 108 megawatts of operational capacity, according to a November report by JLL.
With major hyperscalers having lined up projects in the city, Srihari Srinivasan, director and data centre services lead for Savills India, told Mingtiandi that the Telangana capital could soon move up the ranks of India’s digital infrastructure hubs.
“With the foray of Microsoft and AWS in a large way in Hyderabad between 2023 to 2024, overall operational capacity of Hyderabad would surpass that of Chennai by end of 2025 to early 2026 as Chennai is yet to have hyperscalers’ directly looking to venture into the city,” Srinivasan said.
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