Curriculum Data Centres and the Cloud
Data Centres and the Cloud
The physical backbone of the digital economy: what data centres are, why India is building so many, the economics of the cloud, power and water needs, AI's demand for compute, latency and edge centres, data localisation, hyperscaler investments, jobs, location choices and the future of India's digital infrastructure.
- What Is a Data Centre? What data centres are, what happens inside them, and why every app, payment and video depends on these large, power-hungry buildings. 📄 Read-aloud
- India's Data Centre Boom How India's data centre capacity is growing rapidly, why demand is rising, and which companies are investing. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Economics of the Cloud Why companies rent computing from cloud providers instead of owning servers, how pay-as-you-go pricing works, and why cloud markets are concentrated. 📄 Read-aloud
- Power: The Biggest Cost Why electricity is the largest operating cost for data centres, how efficiency is measured by PUE, and why data centres seek renewable power. 📄 Read-aloud
- Cooling and Water How data centres use water for cooling, why this matters in water-stressed Indian cities, and newer cooling technologies that save water. 📄 Read-aloud
- AI and the Demand for Compute How training and running AI models require vast numbers of specialised chips, why this is driving a data centre boom, and India's IndiaAI Mission to provide compute. 📄 Read-aloud
- Data Centres and the Cloud: Checkpoint 1 Quick checkpoint - five questions on data centres, India's boom, the cloud, power and AI. 5 questions
- Latency and Edge Data Centres Why the distance between users and servers matters for speed, how small edge data centres in tier-2 cities cut delays, and which services need them most. 📄 Read-aloud
- Data Localisation Rules How rules requiring some data to be stored in India, like the RBI's 2018 payments rule, boost local data centres, and the debate about costs and sovereignty. 📄 Read-aloud
- Hyperscalers Come to India How Amazon, Microsoft and Google are investing billions of dollars in Indian cloud regions and data centres, and what this means for Indian businesses. 📄 Read-aloud
- Where to Build a Data Centre How companies choose data centre locations based on power, connectivity, land, water, disaster risk and incentives, and why Mumbai and Chennai lead in India. 📄 Read-aloud
- Jobs and Skills in Data Centres How many jobs data centres create during construction and operation, the skills needed, and why their local employment is smaller than their investment size suggests. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Future of India's Digital Infrastructure Where India's data centre industry is heading - AI, green power, sovereign cloud and edge computing - and a recap of the module. 📄 Read-aloud