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Africa Compute Tracker

CPT1 Cape Town Data Centre

Also known as Africa Data Centres CPT1, ADC CPT1, Cassava Technologies Cape Town

Status
Expanding
Location
Cape Town, South Africa
Operator
Africa Data Centres
IT load
6 MW planned
Timeline
Not disclosed
Last verified

Overview

CPT1 Cape Town Data Centre is the Cape Town campus of ADC, a subsidiary of Cassava Technologies (chairman: Strive Masiyiwa, CEO: Adil El Youssefi).

Cassava is an NVIDIA Cloud Partner (NCP), deploying NVIDIA accelerated computing platforms and AI software using NCP reference architectures. The SA deployment was targeted by June 2025. This formally designates ADC facilities as capable of AI model training — not just inference — making CPT1 one of the very few facilities in Africa with confirmed training workloads.

Cassava markets this as "Africa's first AI Factory", providing AI as a Service (AIaaS) to businesses, governments, and researchers across the continent.

ADC also announced deals with Google and OpenAI at the Africa Tech Festival 2025.

Stanlib Infrastructure Fund II (a South African institutional investor, co-head: Andy Louw) acquired a major stake in ADC's South African operations, approved approximately end-January 2026. This introduces domestic institutional capital into what had been a foreign-owned infrastructure play.

ADC operates a 12MW solar farm near Bloemfontein in partnership with Distributed Power Africa, feeding into the South African portfolio under wheeling arrangements.

A 6MW expansion of this site was noted in the UCT source. Existing operational capacity is not stated — the 6MW in the capacity field refers to the expansion only.

Capacity

What IT load means
IT load — full buildout
6 MW
6MW is the expansion figure; existing campus capacity not stated in source.
reported Source [s1]

Power in context

6 MW of IT load is roughly the average demand of 17,400 South African households (at 250 kWh per month).

That is 0.4% of Cape Town's peak grid demand (1,676 MW).

It is 0.02% of South Africa's effective grid capacity (~30 GW available).

Comparable to a mid-size cloud data centre.

Announced versus operating capacity

Infrastructure

Tier certification explained
Connectivity
Cassava Technologies pan-African fibre-optic network (high-speed, ultra-low-latency)
Pan-African fibre network owned by Cassava Technologies, described as high-speed ultra-low-latency.
confirmed Source [s2]
AI cooling readiness
Not assessed

Cooling adequacy for AI workloads has not been independently assessed for this facility.

AI racks draw around 100 kW each, about ten times a conventional rack, so rack-level liquid cooling is the key differentiator. Training versus inference

Power

PPAs and wheeling
Grid utility
City of Cape Town
Grid carbon intensity
900 g CO₂/kWh
City of Cape Town sources power from Eskom grid; Eskom average ~900 gCO₂/kWh per Eskom Integrated Reports (2022-23). Grid-level figure, not facility-specific.
estimated Source [s1]
PPA partners
Distributed Power Africa
12MW solar farm near Bloemfontein with Distributed Power Africa, powering ADC SA facilities under wheeling.
reported Source [s1]

Grid carbon in context

900 g CO₂/kWh: very high — coal-heavy grid. That is 2.1 times the global average of 436 g (IEA, 2022). For comparison, France is about 60, the UK about 175 and the US about 400.

Grid-level estimate. PPAs and on-site renewables may lower the effective footprint.

Water

Water stress explained
Water source
Municipal
Water stress (WRI)
High

Governance

Data residency explained
Jurisdiction
South Africa
Data residency
Data physically resident in South Africa under POPIA jurisdiction

Workloads

Training versus inference
  • AI training
  • AI inference
  • General cloud
  • Colocation

AI training and inference capacity confirmed. Cassava/ADC is an NVIDIA Cloud Partner (NCP), deploying NVIDIA accelerated computing and AI software using NCP reference architectures. NVIDIA GPU supercomputers enable model training, fine-tuning, and advanced inference. Designated as Africa's first "AI Factory" by Cassava. Additional deals with Google and OpenAI announced at Africa Tech Festival 2025.

Sources

How sources are ranked
  1. [s0]
    CPT1 Cape Town Data Centre, Africa Data Centres

    company official Retrieved 29 June 2026 Not yet archived

  2. [s1]
    Wheeling and dealing behind South Africa's AI factories, UCT AI Initiative

    trade press Retrieved 11 May 2026 Not yet archived

  3. [s2]
    Cassava Technologies announces Africa's first AI Factory powered by NVIDIA, Cassava Technologies

    company official Retrieved 11 May 2026 Not yet archived

What these source types mean
company official
Press releases, investor relations filings, and product pages from the operating company.
trade press
Specialist outlets (DatacenterDynamics, DataCenter Knowledge, etc.) with editorial standards.