UAE and China partner on $500M Ethiopian energy project

Hodler Investments from the UAE has teamed up with China’s GCL Energy Investment to create a distributed energy infrastructure project in Ethiopia aimed at powering advanced data centers.

The collaboration will focus on using underutilised Ethiopian electricity to support next-generation data centers, aligning with Ethiopia’s ambition to expand its data center market from $95 million in 2022 to $226 million by 2028.

According to a statement, Golden Concord Group, GCL Energy’s parent company, will supply the necessary infrastructure to maximise Ethiopia's energy potential for data center operations.

This project supports Ethiopia’s digital economy growth by providing crucial energy resources for data processing centers.

“Our strategic partnership with GCL Group will accelerate our mission to build distributed energy infrastructure to power compute clusters that optimise wasted energy resources regionally. It will offer equitable energy infrastructure that strengthens the African position for integrating data mining systems that support a sovereign digital economy,” stated Mohamed El Masri, managing director of Hodler Investments.

Wang Dong, CEO of GCL Energy Investment, noted that the partnership aims to “solve various challenges facing the energy sector in Ethiopia,” including addressing the renewable funding gap and accelerating decarbonisation efforts.

In addition to this partnership, Hodler Investments recently announced a $500 million Digital Energy Infrastructure (DEI) Fund.

The DEI Fund is intended to support energy infrastructure projects that contribute to the growth of Ethiopia’s digital economy and enhance energy solutions across Africa.

This partnership between UAE and Chinese firms reflects a commitment to sustainable energy solutions, aiming to meet the growing demands of the digital economy in Ethiopia and beyond.