- New Equinix IBX CN1 facility with 800-cabinet Phase 1 capacity
- Designed for hybrid multicloud, liquid cooling and 99.999% uptime
What happened: Equinix launches first AI-ready IBX in Tamil Nadu to support compute demand
Equinix, a leading global digital infrastructure provider, has opened its first AI-ready International Business Exchange® (IBX®) data centre in Chennai, India. The facility, named CN1, lies on a nearly six-acre plot in Siruseri, Tamil Nadu. Its Phase 1 offers 800 cabinets and it will eventually scale to 4,250 cabinets. The site links directly to Equinix’s Mumbai campus, which already hosts three IBX data centres.
Equinix invested about US$69 million in building CN1. It incorporates high-density liquid cooling, robust power systems and interconnection services including Equinix Fabric® and Equinix’s Fabric Cloud Router. It provides enterprises low-latency access to cloud providers and global partners. Equinix states CN1 joins more than 270 data centres the company operates worldwide across 77 markets. The firm claims 96% renewable energy use globally, including in India, to match sustainability standards in its operations.
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Why it’s important
This new facility helps meet India’s growing demand for compute infrastructure, especially for AI workloads and cloud-native applications. Businesses in Chennai can now access enterprise-grade data centre capacity closer to their operations, improving latency and performance. Equinix’s experience operating global facilities lends credibility to its delivery: the company already serves more than 10,000 customers across its global footprint.
The inclusion of Equinix Fabric and liquid cooling design aligns with global best practices for data centre efficiency. Use of renewable energy sources supports international sustainability norms. As cloud adoption increases and AI becomes more central to business operations in India, infrastructures like CN1 matter. They help local players and global cloud providers alike expand services without compromising reliability or connectivity.
