China spends billions on eight national data center hubs
The Chinese computer project ‘East Data West’ is apparently in full swing. 6.1 billion dollars has already been invested in eight data centers spread across the country. The project is due to be completed in 2025.
The project was announced in February 2022 with the aim of completing eight national computing hubs and ten national data center clusters, thus shifting more computing resources to China’s western regions and processing data generated in the east.
It is part of a larger group of projects aimed at improving the country’s computing capacity and speed. The aim is to double computing power by 50% by 2025. The latest announcement shows that work is well underway, with the total number of racks now exceeding 1.95 million, up from 1.46 million in March 2024. The utilization rate is 63%, up 4% from 2022.
East Data West Computing
The figures were announced by Liu Liehong, director of the National Data Bureau, during a speech at the recent Big Data Expo 2024.
Liu also pointed out that the network latency between the eastern and western hub nodes meets the requirement of 20 milliseconds, and the power utilization efficiency (PUE) of newly built data centers is only 1.04, in contrast to the global average of about 1.5 PUE.
China’s drive for IT dominance came around the same time that the US imposed additional restrictions on technology in China, including limits on chip exports and the import of Chinese-made technology to the US and its allies.
Recent technological developments such as AI could have a major impact on daily life and politics. World powers are determined to stay one step ahead of each other in the technological race, with advances in data centers and network infrastructure leading the way.