EDGE COMPUTING The modern telco and data centre architecture now comprises multiple levels: the traditional large-scale central or core data centres, regional data centres and a rapidly expanding frontier of‘ far-edge’ sites located in or near cell towers, factories and urban centres.
Within this dynamic, the role of the core data centre is not diminishing but evolving.
These facilities will remain indispensable for large-scale, non-latency-sensitive workloads, such as training complex AI models, long-term data archiving and batch processing for business intelligence.
The new edge tier – consisting of micro data centres, containerised modular data centres( MDCs) and even single-rack deployments – is designed to handle real-time data ingestion, rapid AI inference and local decision-making.
The market reflects this shift, with forecasts projecting the edge data centre market to reach over US $ 109 billion by 2034, catalysed by 5G and the Internet of Things( IoT).
This long-term, compounding demand is a key strategic consideration for infrastructure providers.
As Andrew Power, President & CEO of Digital Realty, observes, the drivers for data centre growth are building upon one another.
“ It’ s like a layer cake of incremental demand that started years ago and keeps going,” says Andrew.“ We’ re still seeing a roll out of 5G networks and then there
188 September 2025