TEECL wins contract from RailTel to build over 100 edge data centres

Techno Electric and Engineering Company (TEECL) will be building transfer edge data centres (EDC) for RailTel in 102 Indian cities. TEECL, as business associate of RailTel will design, build, finance and operate transfer EDCs. This contract is over a 20-year concession period, extendable by five years. To be sure, EDCs are smaller data centres closer to the users’ devices. 

“This is a major milestone for us and a testament to our commitment to building digital infrastructure for the people of India. We are bullish about digital empowerment in India, and this contract with RailTel will allow us to fulfil the needs of a rapidly growing digital population,” said Ankit Saraiya, Director of Techno Electric & Engineering Company Limited (TEECL).

We are honoured to be RailTel's Business Associate and look forward to a long association, he added. 

The optic fibre network of RailTel, the public sector undertaking wholly owned by the Indian Railways, is spread across important towns and cities, including rural areas, covering over 70% of India’s population. Through this partnership, the data centre vertical of TEECL hopes to enhance the digital experience and drive the adoption of digital services among residents of rural and urban areas, contributing to the country's Digital India mission.

The plan to establish these EDCs was announced in 2022 by RailTel. The estimated cost of the project was then said to be ₹500 crore. The initial capacity of the proposed data centres at each location is 20 racks (5 KW to 10 KW each), Mint had reported then.

The localised data centres will be utilised for serving rural areas with low latency applications related to digital skills, financial inclusions, digital literacy etc.