Civo plans 40 UK edge data centres to power sovereign AI inference

UK cloud provider Civo is building a national network of 40 liquid-cooled edge data centres with a planned combined capacity of one gigawatt, aimed at running AI inference close to UK organisations rather than training models abroad. The first site, in Hertfordshire, is being fitted out to open at 8MW and expand to 38MW on the same plot; five more sites totalling 150MW are secured in Lancashire, Greater Manchester, London and Oxfordshire, with the rest planned over three years. The Register reports the Hertfordshire site is due by March 2027 with Nvidia Vera Rubin systems. Civo first announced the plan on 22 September; Seb Johnson flagged it as the kind of compute build-out the UK and Europe badly need.