Digital Realty Plans 70MW Sydney Facility to Replace Legacy Data Center
April 2, 2026
In a significant move to modernize Sydney's critical digital infrastructure, a legacy data center in the city's Macquarie Park/North Ryde precinct is slated for demolition and replacement with a far larger facility. The redevelopment underscores the intense demand for high-capacity data center space in key Asia-Pacific hubs, driven by cloud adoption and AI workloads.
According to a State Environmental Planning Policy (SEARS) application submitted to the New South Wales government, a new 70-megawatt (MW) data center is planned for the 1.2-hectare site at 23-25 Waterloo Road. The existing single-story structure will be replaced by a purpose-built, eight-story facility encompassing 23,375 square meters. The application was filed by Willowtree Planning for Greenbox Architecture, with site documents identifying global data center giant Digital Realty as the project client.
The project represents a substantial capital investment, with estimates reaching up to AU$700 million (approximately US$482 million). This marks a dramatic evolution for a site Digital Realty acquired in 2013 for AU$11.75 million. The location has a long history in the industry, first zoned for data center use in 2000. It was originally operated by Exodus Corporation before being purchased by Fujitsu in 2002 following Exodus's bankruptcy. Fujitsu, which leased the entire site to Digital Realty until 2016, still lists it as its North Ryde facility—a 3,600 sqm, single-data-hall site offering 4.8MW of capacity. Digital Realty previously operated it as its SYD13 location, though it is not currently featured on the company's online portal.
The planned 70MW facility signals a strategic upgrade to meet contemporary power and density requirements. For Digital Realty, this redevelopment strengthens its footprint in a core Sydney market, transforming an aging asset into a state-of-the-art infrastructure platform. The move also aligns with broader industry trends, where operators are actively consolidating and upgrading older sites to improve efficiency and scale. Furthermore, it occurs amid reports in 2024 that Fujitsu was exploring a sale of its Australian data center operations, highlighting the dynamic ownership and investment landscape in the region's digital infrastructure sector.
Source: datacenterdynamics
