Capacity and speed: why TikTok shelved its second Irish data centre

The Sorting Office, Dublin, home of TikTok’s Ireland operations. Image: © Noel/Stock.adobe.com

TikTok points to capacity constraints and slow infrastructure development as the deciding factors in shelving its planned second data centre, but leaves door open to future opportunities.

The need for greater capacity, and the infrastructure development environment – these were the two key factors behind TikTok shelving a planned second data centre in Dublin, a company spokesperson told SiliconRepublic.com today (2 April) while confirming the reported decision.

Instead, the ByteDance-owned company will focus its European data storage expansion in some of its other locations – in particular, sites in Norway and one in Finland.

TikTok said that when looking at its various sites across Europe, it considered where could best meet its growing capacity demands as regards infrastructure and the speed of development, and that the Nordic countries were a better fit for those considerations.

The company said Ireland remained one of its biggest and most important strategic sites in Europe and, should future opportunities arise that did meet its capacity needs in particular, it would remain open to exploring them.

The spokesperson emphasised that the existing data centre operation in Ireland, which came online in 2023, remains fully operational as an important part of its Project Clover, and that TikTok is still very much committed to Ireland.

Project Clover is the Chinese-owned platform’s initiative designed to update its data security practices across Europe, so as not to fall foul of strict European data privacy regulations.

Part of that commitment involves storing the data of more than 150m monthly TikTok users in Europe locally across three data centres. The original stated plan was for two in Dublin and one in Norway.

TikTok had originally planned to lease data centre space at Echelon’s campus in Clondalkin, Dublin, as part of a three-site strategy. However, as Irish newspaper the Business Post was first to report earlier this week, plans for the second Irish data centre have been shelved.

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