On November 22, 2010, MIGA issued a guarantee of €500,000 to Linx Telecommunications B.V. (Linx) of the Netherlands covering its shareholder loan to its subsidiary, Linx LLC Svyaz VSD of the Russian Federation.^[1] MIGA also issued two guarantees for a total of €6.9 million covering ABN Amro’s non-shareholder loans to the subsidiary.^[2] This project consists of construction and operation of a Tier 3 data center in St. Petersburg and operation of Module 5 of a data center in Moscow that will provide state-of-the art data center and connectivity services to primarily international customers.

The project hopes to leverage shared infrastructure and data management in order to reach economies of scale—thereby stimulating growth of technology-intensive and knowledge-based industries in Russia. Specifically, the project expects the following development results: improvement of information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure and access to information; a lower cost of entry into the ICT market; increased competition in ICT market; rapidly expanding data/telecom networks; and local employment opportunities.

The World Bank Group’s current Country Partnership Strategy for Russia notes a need for increased private sector development and diversification of the economy—to which this project will contribute.

The project was underwritten through MIGA’s Small Investment Program.