The Bolivian president has announced a US$20 million investment to build a new data centre in the city of El Alto, the country’s second-largest city in Bolivia, located adjacent to La Paz in Pedro Domingo Murillo Province in the west of the country close to the Peruvian and Chilean borders.
During a session celebrating the 38th anniversary of the city last week, President Luis Arce this week announced what he called the ‘Alternate Data Centre’ project, which he described a ‘milestone’ for digitization in the country.
According to the Data Centre Dynamics website, the facility will be located in District 2 to the south and will ‘house computer systems on a national scale’, benefiting the 14 districts of the city.
It will involve a pre-investment of around US$112,000 rising to a total estimated investment of more than US$20.3 million. It’s not clear when construction of the centre will begin or what the deadline is likely to be for completion,
The new data centre is expected to house identity information relating to the population and support the General Personal Identification Service that covers identity cards and driving licenses.
Tigo and Entel already own and operate facilities in the country, though this seems to be the first government-owned centre and certainly the first in El Alto, a fast-growing city with an estimated population of 1,096,162. El Alto is also way above sea level – in fact it is the highest major city on earth.