With the inauguration of this first building, named SIN01, “I am witnessing not only the doubling of current ‘data center’ capacity in Portugal,” but also “the future of the Portuguese economy,” stated an official.
The statement was made during the inauguration session of the first of six buildings that Start Campus plans to construct in Sines, located in the Setúbal district, by 2030. The complex will feature a capacity of 1.2 Gigawatts (GW) with a combined total investment of 8.5 billion euros.
The official highlighted that this investment enables the “creation of qualified employment, a specialized and technically skilled workforce with a broad support network [that] spans from security to telecommunications maintenance, energy management, and generation,” alongside an “integrated infrastructure network.”
This investment “allows the transition from mere data transmission to data processing and computation, where the real added national value lies,” they emphasized.
During the ceremony, Pedro Reis also pointed out “the significant and structural economic impact” of this project on “the volume of exports,” at the level of “services, the acquisition of specialized technical equipment, and the densification of a business ecosystem.”
In terms of sustainability, the official highlighted the “advanced technologies, utilizing seawater, renewable energy, self-consumption solutions, and water treatment and reutilization.”
This investment represents “a reflection of what the Portuguese economy can become,” spanning “strategic alliances, profound American investment attraction, taxation, infrastructure, incentives, human talent, and value chains,” they argued.
During the inauguration of Start Campus’s first building, Robert Dunn, CEO of Start Campus, mentioned that this is the largest scale data center campus in Europe designed for Artificial Intelligence.
“Our state-of-the-art facilities will strengthen the digital ecosystem, creating more employment opportunities, attracting talent, and providing a solid foundation for Portugal’s economic growth,” he asserted.
In a statement, Start Campus explained that it is “funded by global investors, such as Davidson Kempner Capital Management LP and Pioneer Point Partners, who enabled the construction of the first building entirely privately without public capital, with the support of an American bank.”
According to the company, the construction of the second building (SIN02), with a capacity of 180 MW (the first has 26 MW), is scheduled to commence mid-year.
