NTT East Corporation has joined a consortium of data center, telecommunications, energy, and infrastructure companies seeking to develop Ishikari City in Hokkaido into a major data center cluster. The Ishikari Data Center Consortium will focus on strengthening the infrastructure needed to support data center development, including power and telecommunications networks. The group will also work with local authorities to establish incentives and other measures to support further development.
The consortium includes Sakura Internet, Kyocera, Tokyu Land Corporation, Ishikari Renewable Energy Data Center No. 1 LLC, Flower Communications, Broadband Tower Inc., NTT ME Corporation, Ishikari Regional Energy LLC, Liene Inc., and Hokkaido Integrated Communications Network Co., Ltd., also known as HotNet. This broad membership reflects the cross-sector collaboration required to build a sustainable data center ecosystem in a region still emerging as a digital infrastructure hub.
Ishikari, located in Hokkaido's Ishikari Subprefecture, is gaining traction as a data center location, with the Ishikari Bay New Port area offering access to renewable energy resources and relatively low disaster risks. The consortium aims to promote Ishikari as a domestic data center hub and one of Japan's leading data center clusters. NTT East said the consortium will work to ensure that residents and local businesses experience the social value of data center development while promoting Ishikari as a data center cluster nationwide.
The initiative builds on existing momentum in the region. Sakura Internet has operated its data center in Ishikari since 2011, and has expanded the site while deploying GPUs there. In 2024, Tokyu Land, Flower Communications, and Broadband Tower partnered on a 15-MW data center project in Ishikari, which is due to launch in 2026. These projects underscore the area's growing appeal for both traditional cloud infrastructure and AI-driven workloads.
The push adds to Hokkaido's broader data center footprint. Data Center Map lists nine data centers on the island, centered around Sapporo, with operators including SoftBank, Kyocera, HotNet, Sakura Internet, KDDI, and Rakuten. Eurus Energy is also developing a wind-powered data center project in Wakkanai, northern Hokkaido, highlighting the region's potential for renewable-energy-backed digital infrastructure.
NTT East provides services from around 30 data center locations in Japan, including facilities in Tokyo, Yokohama, Chiba, Saitama, Ibaraki, Tochigi, and Gunma. NTT's telecommunications businesses also include NTT West, NTT DOCOMO, and NTT Communications. By bringing together companies involved in Ishikari's data center, energy, and communications infrastructure, the consortium aims to strengthen the foundational systems needed for data center operations and coordinate with local government to establish Ishikari as a larger data center hub in Japan.