Saudi Arabia has entered the worldwide race for large-scale digital infrastructure with the launch of the Hexagon Information Centre in Riyadh, described because the world’s largest authorities knowledge centre and labeled as Tier IV, the best worldwide commonplace for reliability.
The Hexagon Information Centre goals to deploy superior applied sciences to assist the Kingdom’s developmental sectors at a time when knowledge has develop into a main driver of recent financial and social transformation.
The initiative aligns with the nationwide technique led by Saudi Information and AI Authority and the targets of Saudi Imaginative and prescient 2030, positioning Saudi Arabia on the forefront of nations leveraging superior applied sciences for human profit and nationwide progress.
Large new authorities knowledge centre in Saudi Arabia
The centre displays the imaginative and prescient of Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Crown Prince and Prime Minister and Chairman of SDAIA’s Board of Administrators, to determine Saudi Arabia as a world hub for superior applied sciences.
Growing sturdy digital infrastructure has been recognized as a strategic necessity to make sure technical sovereignty over nationwide knowledge whereas supporting financial diversification past oil.
Saudi Arabia already ranks first globally on a number of indicators, together with authorities technique within the International AI Index.
Information centres have advanced considerably since their origins within the Nineteen Fifties, when giant climate-controlled rooms had been constructed to accommodate supercomputers.
Their significance accelerated with the rise of the web within the late Nineties and expanded additional following the launch of cloud computing companies in 2006.
By 2020, knowledge centres had develop into an financial precedence for governments worldwide, a pattern intensified by generative synthetic intelligence, which requires immense processing energy out there solely in extremely superior amenities. In consequence, knowledge centres have reshaped the idea of financial wealth from finite pure assets to limitless digital flows.
Saudi Information and AI Authority function
Since its institution in 2019, SDAIA has led Saudi Arabia’s nationwide knowledge and AI agenda, serving because the official authority chargeable for knowledge, huge knowledge and synthetic intelligence, in addition to the nationwide reference for regulation, improvement and utilisation.
Inside six years, the Kingdom has emerged as a serious participant within the world digital financial system and the main vacation spot within the Center East for main worldwide know-how firms. SDAIA has constructed an built-in knowledge ecosystem described as probably the most superior within the area, delivering progressive digital merchandise with important financial and social impression.
Past technical improvement, SDAIA has overseen the creation of a complete legislative and regulatory framework for knowledge and AI.
Key measures embrace:
- The Private Information Safety Legislation and its implementing rules
- Rules and requirements for generative AI
- The AI Adoption Framework
- Guidelines governing the Nationwide Register of Controllers
- The applying of worldwide greatest practices to safeguard knowledge and privateness
Nationwide community and financial impression
The Hexagon Information Centre is meant as the inspiration for a future nationwide community of knowledge centres below SDAIA’s strategic enlargement plan.
The programme goals to satisfy rising demand for nationwide digital infrastructure companies whereas guaranteeing most system availability based mostly on worldwide benchmarks.
SDAIA’s technique targets a cumulative native financial impression exceeding SR10bn ($2.67bn) from the Kingdom’s knowledge centres, alongside annual monetary financial savings of greater than SR1.8bn ($480m).
These advantages are anticipated to assist non-oil financial development and improve high quality of life by advancing the digital maturity of presidency companies.
Scale and sustainability
The Hexagon Information Centre has a capability of 480 MW and spans greater than 30 million sq. ft. It incorporates superior energy-efficiency and sensible cooling applied sciences, together with direct liquid cooling and hybrid cooling techniques, to realize minimal energy utilization effectiveness.
Renewable vitality is built-in as an influence supply, supporting its classification as one of many world’s largest inexperienced knowledge centres constructed to the U.S. Inexperienced Constructing Council’s LEED Gold requirements.
The power has achieved worldwide accreditation below the TIA-942 commonplace, a number one world benchmark for knowledge centre engineering.
It has additionally obtained Tier IV certification, guaranteeing fault tolerance and operational availability of 99.995 per cent, in addition to ISO/IEC 22237 certification, which ensures infrastructure resilience and safety towards technical and environmental dangers.
