China Eximbank provides RMB 945,551,000 government concessional loan for construction of IV Tier National Data Center Project in Kaliakoir

Project narrative

On April 15, 2016, China Eximbank and the Government of Bangladesh signed an RMB 945,551,000 government concessional loan (GCL) agreement for the Tier IV National Data Center Project in Kaliakoir. The GCL carried the following borrowing terms: a 2% interest rate, a 20-year maturity, a 5-year grace period, and a 0.2% commitment fee (service charge). The borrower was expected to use the proceeds of the loan to finance a $154 million commercial contract between ZTE Corporation and the Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC). According to the Government of Bangladesh’s Economic Relations Division (ERD), the GCL had achieved a disbursement rate of 56.1% (RMB 530,620,000 out of RMB 945,551,000) as of June 30, 2018, 82.1% (RMB 776,875,000 out of RMB 945,551,000) as of June 30, 2019, 100% (RMB 945,551,000 out of RMB 945,551,000) as of June 30, 2020, and 100% (RMB 945,551,000 out of RMB 945,551,000) as of June 30, 2021. No repayments on the GCL had been made as of June 30, 2018, June 30, 2019, June 30, 2020 or June 30, 2021. The purpose of this project was to build a flagship Tier IV Data Center in the Kaliakair Upazila within Gazipur District and the Division of Dhaka to store and process a large amount of official data. ZTE Corporation was the contractor responsible for project implementation and its work was overseen by the Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC). As of 2017, the data center had been constructed, but the operational status of the data center was delayed by U.S. government sanctions on ZTE. In October 2018, the data center underwent operational tests. The project was officially completed on November 29, 2019. The Bangladesh National Data Center (NDC) is the first national data center that received both the UPTIME Tier IV design certification and facility certification in the country and is also the first data center in South Asia that got UPTIME Tier IV facility certification. In addition, the data center passed all the test items of the Uptime Tier IV construction certification, thereby being highly appraised by the Uptime Institute. During the construction of the data center, the ZTE construction team reportedly overcame a series of challenges, such as inconvenient transportation, unstable power supply, and bad weather.