Modular Data Centers ups capacity, reaches 12MW in LatAm projects backlog

Brazil’s Modular Data Centers has reached approximately 12MW contracted for datacenter projects in Latin America, between enterprise, edge and hyperscale sites.

“We have a very large backlog of orders, which must be produced and delivered by the middle of next year. Hence the expansion of our production capacity,” the company’s head of business development, Marcos Paraiso, told BNamericas.

Aside from Brazil, the backlog includes Chile, Colombia and Mexico. Additionally, Modular is in final negotiations to close contracts for projects in two other countries in the region. The clients are regional and global companies, said Paraiso (pictured).

One of Latin America’s biggest developer of modular datacenter solutions, the company has invested over 50mn reais (US$10.4mn) to expand its factory in Brazil to 40,000m2, divided into two warehouses where it carries out preparation, integration, testing and assembly.

With the expansion, output capacity has reached 98 modules per month. These can either become a small datacenter or be part of a larger datacenter.

In the enterprise segment, Modular is serving demand for private datacenters with 4-20 racks and 100-200KW capacity. Customers include municipalities and retail companies.

In the bigger colocation segment, the company serves large-scale datacenter customers. 

“For these larger customers, our idea is to significantly reduce equipment delivery times,” Paraiso said.

This is the case of hyperscale provider Scala, Modular's main customer and with whom it has a long-term alliance as part of Scala’s FastDeploy building strategy.

On average, the construction of a traditional datacenter structure takes up to 18 months, considering environmental licensing and energy issues, among others. Modular's bet is to optimize this process through the simultaneous development of a project’s core features (data hall and power) to deliver the “heart” of the datacenter ready for operation, he said.

The strategy can combine a horizontal, traditional datacenter approach with a modular one to accelerate projects, and the company is now working on projects involving up to 36MW.

"We have other clients we are talking to, with projects under negotiation and others in development. We just had modules leaving our factory for four smaller clients, supplying projects in different regions," said Paraiso.

Last month, Modular unveiled a regional partnership with US firm Vertiv covering Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Peru.

The deal will see Vertiv contribute its thermal and power management solutions for critical infrastructure, while Modular will provide its expertise in the design, fabrication and integration of modular prefabricated datacenters (PFM).

“The traditional way of building a datacenter not only no longer meets market demand but is also creating an ever-increasing gap between the speed at which digital services are made available and accessed, and the speed at which the backend of datacenters that support them is able to increase,” said Paraiso.

The executive expects several edge datacenter projects to be implemented in the next 12-18 months. 

These will involve telecom tower companies, some of which are attaching smaller processing datacenters to their tower structures (microedge); submarine cable firms looking to offer low-latency colocation services to clients next to cable landing stations; and fiber optics companies. 

Without disclosing the revenue figure, Paraiso said Modular expects 2023 revenues to jump 250% based on a forecast that only includes the current backlog of projects.

The company also plans to increase its headcount to 1,000-1,200 by year-end from today’s 500.

The company plans to continue with is sole focus on the fast-growing modular datacenter niche, unlike other firms that offer modular solutions as part of a broader portfolio such as Dell, HP, Huawei and Schneider Electric.

"Our ambition is big. Not regional or local. We want to be a global player in this market," said Paraiso.