The Data Centre Summit returns for its second edition on 29 October 2026, co-located with the C&I Energy + Storage Summit at The Maslow Hotel in Johannesburg. Following its debut alongside Enlit Africa in Cape Town, the Summit responds to a clear industry need: a platform that connects the growth of artificial intelligence and digital infrastructure with the power, cooling, financing and sustainability challenges shaping data centre development across Africa.
The programme will examine why data centres are emerging as a new industrial powerhouse and what coordinated action is required from operators, hyperscalers, utilities, independent power producers and investors to capture Africa’s share of global demand.
Cooling will be a central focus, with sessions exploring the shift from air to liquid cooling as rack densities increase. Discussions will consider deployment at scale, high-performance infrastructure, water availability, waste-heat reuse and the pressure that freshwater scarcity places on cooling decisions.
A South Africa country spotlight will assess the wheeling landscape, grid congestion, regulatory developments and investor sentiment influencing near-term project delivery. The programme will also explore the operational realities of maintaining 24/7 power supply through renewable blending, co-location and evolving generation technologies.
A dedicated case study will unpack how Cape Town, the first African city to launch a formal data strategy, is balancing spatial planning, resource constraints and public transparency against the rapid site approvals demanded by hyperscale growth. This will be paired with a cross-sector conversation on how surging digital workloads are drawing municipal grid capacity and independent power producers into closer alignment, and what coordinated, energy-led siting means for the next wave of facilities coming online across the continent.
Parallel masterclasses will focus on implementation, practical data centre design for African conditions and the barriers limiting clean energy investment. These sessions will address project bankability, power availability, execution risk, grid instability, contractor capacity and blended-finance solutions, giving delegates concrete tools to move projects from concept to bankable reality.
Co-location with the C&I Energy + Storage Summit, created by VUKA Group, places data centre operators in direct conversation with the customers, energy providers, financiers and technical partners responsible for powering Africa’s digital backbone.
