Microsoft To Spend $1 Billion On Datacenters In North Carolina

Microsoft is building four datacenters in North Carolina as part of a phased development that will see it invest at least $1 billion over the next decade. The Register reports: The datacenter expansion will see Microsoft construct the facilities at sites in Conover, Maiden and two at Hickory in Catawba County, creating at least 50 new jobs, according to the Catawba County Economic Development Corporation. Economic development agreements and incentive grants for the project were approved at a joint meeting this week by the Catawba County Board of Commissioners along with the elected councils of Conover, Hickory and Maiden. The terms of the agreement include a guaranteed minimum investment over 10 years in Catawba County from Microsoft of $1 billion, with each municipality getting $332 million, with an additional $33 million to Hickory for its second site. Microsoft will get performance-based incentive grants of 50 percent real property value and 85 percent personal property value, to be awarded over ten years. This means that over that period, the local government bodies will essentially pay back that proportion of Microsoft's property taxes, according to reports in local media The Charlotte Observer. Microsoft did not state what capacity the new datacenters will have once built, but they are set to take up a combined 687 acres of land between them. The expansion is likely to be additional capacity for Microsoft Azure cloud. Currently, Microsoft already operates more than 200 datacenters globally. Last year, Microsoft said it planned to build new facilities in at least 10 more countries, and that it aimed to construct between 50 and 100 new datacenters each year for the foreseeable future.

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