MTN Group, Africa’s largest telecom operator, is in advanced talks with United States and European firms to develop data centers across the continent to power artificial intelligence services.

The move is part of the company’s strategy to fill Africa’s massive AI infrastructure gap and unlock new revenue streams, according to CEO Ralph Mupita.

Mupita said MTN will directly fund part of the investment for the AI data center build-out while working with global partners, including co-investors, AI infrastructure firms, and hyperscalers such as Microsoft.

“We are now in the commercial negotiation phase and shortlisting partners who can help us scale. Our goal is to conclude these partnerships within the year,” Mupita told Bloomberg in an interview.

MTN’s AI data center unit, known as Genova, will play a key role in its broader plan to monetize infrastructure, open platforms to third parties, and drive new revenue growth.

Potential partners would follow MTN into the 16 African markets where it operates, particularly where demand for AI services is rising.

A major challenge, however, remains reliable electricity supply. Mupita noted that MTN is exploring all available options to secure efficient power sources for its planned data centers in markets with fragile energy infrastructure.

Under the Genova strategy, MTN Group recently announced that it had begun deploying AI solutions to optimize network traffic and enhance service delivery in Nigeria, as part of a broader continent-wide strategy to transform its operations using responsible AI technologies.

The Group said AI is now being operationalized at scale across its operations through the MTN Genova transformation program.

According to MTN, the deployment in Nigeria is part of a series of targeted AI use cases across key domains, including intelligent fuel consumption management for data centers in South Africa, dynamic energy management in Benin, and fiber cut sensing in Côte d’Ivoire.

MTN Nigeria in July this year launched what it described as West Africa’s largest Tier III data centre—and one of the largest in Africa. Named the Sifiso Dabengwa Data Centre, the facility has a capacity of nine megawatts and is equipped with cloud infrastructure that the telco claims rivals offerings from Amazon, Microsoft, and Google.

Despite having the world’s youngest and fastest-growing population, Africa hosts less than 1% of global AI data center capacity.