A new era of AI infrastructure is emerging in Nigeria, built not as an upgrade but as a foundation for the future.
Nigeria’s ambition to compete in the global artificial intelligence economy is no longer just policy talk—it’s becoming physical reality along the Lekki coastline. There, a vast new data centre campus is rising beside the Atlantic Ocean, purpose-built to support the demands of modern AI. The development, led by Kasi Cloud, is being marketed as Nigeria’s first hyperscale AI data centre campus designed from scratch for AI workloads rather than retrofitted from legacy enterprise systems.
Spread across 42 hectares along the Lagos–Calabar coastal road, the project introduces a scale and design philosophy that Nigeria has yet to see. While the country currently has about 17 operational data centres—none exceeding 20 megawatts (MW) of capacity—global AI campuses increasingly operate between 50 MW and 100 MW or more. This shift reflects the rise of dense GPU racks, each drawing between 50 and 150 kilowatts—far beyond the 30–50 MW benchmarks that once defined large enterprise data centres.
For Johnson Agogbua, founder and CEO of Kasi Cloud, the Lekki campus is an intentional response to this new reality. During a site tour on January 25, 2026, he emphasised that the project was not a retrofit of outdated designs but engineered for AI from the outset.
“This is not a retrofit,” Agogbua said. “This was designed for AI from day one.”
A $250 Million Bet on Nigeria’s Digital Future
Kasi Cloud broke ground on the $250 million hyperscale project in April 2022, with construction starting in mid-2023. The company expects to complete an initial 5.5 MW of capacity by April 2026, with commercial operations beginning in the second quarter of 2026.
The campus is designed to scale far beyond the first building. The first structure is a six-floor facility with four dedicated data halls, each engineered for 8 MW of capacity. That means the building could eventually support up to 32 MW—though the initial phase will occupy only one floor. Kasi Cloud also holds permits to build up to four similar facilities, with the entire campus capable of supporting up to 100 MW of sellable power at full density.
Yet even this projection is constrained by power availability, according to Ngozika Agogbua, Global Director of Marketing and Sales Operations.
“That means we’ll only get to build three facilities,” she said. “We could change the power availability for some of the buildings to spread it across four, but the way that it is divided now, we can only get about three.”
Designed for Density, Not Compromise
The building’s proportions are immediately noticeable. Ceilings are high, corridors wide, and concrete columns thick and closely spaced. Agogbua said these features are not aesthetic choices but practical requirements for heavy equipment and high-density operations.
“If you don’t design for where you’re going on day one, you’ll pay for it later,” he said.
The facility is engineered to handle racks drawing between 10 kW and 100 kW—an essential range for modern AI systems powered by GPUs and accelerators. Sections of the building are structurally reinforced to support heavier equipment and liquid-cooling infrastructure. The goal is to avoid the incremental thinking that has historically constrained Nigeria’s data infrastructure.
“This space is custom-fit for AI,” Agogbua said. “You bring liquid directly to the rack, down to the chipset. Nothing is left to chance.”
Power Infrastructure Built for Reliability
Power is the centrepiece of the design. Large steel columns support solid busbar systems—rigid conductors housed in insulated modular channels—rather than traditional cable bundles. Busbars allow more efficient power distribution and can carry thousands of amps, with taps available along the run to support flexible rack configurations.
The facility is fed by four independent high-voltage lines, enabling full A and B power path redundancy. That means operations can continue even if a line fails or is taken offline for maintenance.
“We’re bringing all four lines in here, not just two,” Agogbua said. “That way, you can schedule any two and remain resilient.”
Dry-type transformers are housed in dedicated electrical rooms, and their size has influenced everything from wall openings to door dimensions and construction sequencing. Agogbua said this required constant coordination between engineers and architects unfamiliar with hyperscale equipment.
“If you’ve never brought this equipment in, you don’t know how to design it,” he said.
Cooling That Matches AI’s Heat
Cooling systems are also designed with AI’s intensity in mind. The facility uses magnetic-drive technologies that minimise noise, allowing engineers to work comfortably while systems run at high capacity during workload spikes.
“All you’ll hear is air moving,” Agogbua said.
Air-handling units over four metres high manage hundreds of kilowatts of heat, while triple HEPA filtration scrubs salt, dust, and particulates from incoming air—a critical feature given the campus’s proximity to the ocean.
Batteries, Fire Safety, and Brutal Realities
Uninterruptible power supply systems rely on lithium-ion batteries housed in reinforced bunkers beneath the building. Compared to older technologies, lithium-ion batteries offer higher energy density, longer life, and faster charging—critical in Nigeria’s unstable grid environment.
But Agogbua was blunt about the risks.
“Lithium doesn’t need oxygen to burn,” he said. “That’s the critical thing.”
Kasi Cloud employs a multi-layered fire-suppression approach: gas-based suppression at the module level, specialized chemical agents to stop thermal runaway, and a final system designed to sacrifice an entire room if needed.
“You don’t cut corners here,” he said. “You spend the money.”
A Meet-Me Room Bigger Than Some Entire Data Centres
The building also includes a large meet-me room where telecom operators interconnect. Agogbua said the space is larger than some existing data centres in Lagos. Two such rooms—north and south—are planned, with fibre ducts buried at a standard depth of 1.8 metres to avoid future disruption.
Kasi Cloud plans to begin onboarding customers once core systems are complete, rather than waiting for cosmetic finishes. The company expects large customers to take entire floors, requiring customised power, cooling, and security setups—a common practice in global hyperscale markets but rare in Nigeria.
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| The layout of the 42-hectare data centre campus. Image source: Kasi Cloud |
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| A hall inside the 6-storey facility in the Kasi Cloud campus. Image source: Kasi Cloud |
Building at this scale is capital-intensive. Nigeria’s supply chains are fragile, and specialised equipment must often be imported. According to industry averages, a 100 MW data centre can cost between $900 million and $1.5 billion.
Globally, Africa accounts for less than 1% of announced GPU capacity. Agogbua sees Kasi Cloud as a step toward changing that.
“The arms race is in North America, Southeast Asia and the Middle East,” he said. “Africa is largely absent.”
Data Sovereignty and Regional Leadership
For Agogbua, data sovereignty is a practical issue. Without local infrastructure, Nigerian companies must host data abroad—paying foreign bandwidth costs and navigating foreign regulations.
“You can’t enforce localisation if you can’t host the data,” he said.
Local infrastructure could help Nigeria become an anchor market for ECOWAS, similar to Europe’s regional data residency approach.
A Campus, Not a Building
Beyond the first structure, the wider campus is still under development. Roads are being built, drainage systems laid, and negotiations continue with host communities. Kasi Cloud’s long-term vision is to attract complementary infrastructure—tower companies, network operators, and service providers—creating a digital ecosystem rather than an isolated facility.
As the tour ended, Agogbua returned to a phrase he repeated throughout: world-class.
“Why should you step into Malaysia and see world-class, then come to Nigeria and accept less?” he asked.
The first building remains unfinished, but the trajectory is clear. Kasi Cloud is betting that Nigeria’s place in the AI economy will be determined not by incremental upgrades, but by infrastructure designed from the ground up for what comes next.