At the Capacity Iraq Connect panel, industry leaders and financiers explored how state-led infrastructure, private capital and international standards can combine to unlock Iraq’s next phase of digital growth.
Moderated by Sabah AlKubaisy, associate partner at Salience Consulting, the discussion brought together perspectives from development finance, consulting, local operators and global standards bodies. The panel examined three core themes: the role of the national backbone, investor appetite for Iraq, and what it will take to catalyse large-scale data centre deployment.
“Iraq is no longer just a transit route,” AlKubaisy set out. “It is becoming a domestic consumer hub, with government policy now focused on localisation, sovereign data and digital readiness. The question is no longer whether Iraq will scale digitally, but how fast, under what model, and with which partners.”
Backbone first: Enabling fibre and competition
At the heart of Iraq’s digital ambitions lies the state-owned backbone network, which has seen significant investment over the past four years. For Antonia Maier, regional head for telecommunications, media and technology at the EBRD, governance and access models are critical to making backbone investments bankable.
“Our experience consistently shows that open access backbone models attract the most private investment,” Maier explained. “When infrastructure is built in a way that allows multiple players to access it fairly, you unlock competition, fibre expansion and innovation downstream.”
She noted that while open access frameworks are conceptually well understood, their implementation requires careful design, particularly in rural areas where returns are slower. Development finance institutions, she said, can play a role in supporting governments to structure frameworks that balance commercial viability with national coverage goals.
Blanca Fernández Cavalheiro, partner at PwC Middle East, framed backbone infrastructure as a long-term financial product. “Investors look at backbone networks in the same way they look at bonds,” she said. “They want predictability, long-term contracts and stable returns.”
She highlighted neutral carrier models as particularly effective, separating infrastructure risk from market risk. “If infrastructure becomes vertically integrated, complexity increases and investor confidence falls. Neutral, open-access models create assets that global capital understands.”
On the ground: Fibre economics improving
From an operator perspective, Ahmed Maher, technical director at Horizon Scope Telecom, described tangible improvements in network stability and resilience.
“Over the past four years, we have seen real progress in the national backbone and international gateways,” Maher said. “Previously, some routes were unreliable on a daily basis. Today, they are stable, and traffic flows have diversified significantly.”
This improvement, he noted, has already changed the economics of fibre deployment and enterprise connectivity. However, pricing remains a challenge. “Domestic connectivity pricing in Iraq is still high compared with regional benchmarks. That affects enterprise customers and digital service providers,” he said, adding that the Ministry of Communications and regulators are actively addressing the issue.
For Maher, lower wholesale pricing will be a key enabler of FTTH expansion, cloud adoption and local content hosting.
Data centres: Demand before hyperscale
While Iraq’s geography positions it as a natural data transit hub, panellists were clear that large-scale data centre investment must be demand-led.
“Hyperscalers rarely arrive first,” said Maier. “The more successful models we see start small, serving local enterprises, banks and government clients. Once that demand is proven, international players follow.”
She pointed to Iraq’s demographics as a major advantage: a population of around 45 million, with a young median age, driving rapid digital adoption. Combined with ongoing government digitalisation, from banking reform to digital identity, this creates a growing base load for data centre services.
Energy, however, remains a gating factor. Reliable, scalable power supply is essential, not just for operational resilience but also for meeting ESG expectations. “Modern data centres must be energy efficient by design,” Maier said. “That lowers operating costs and aligns with the requirements hyperscalers will inevitably bring.”
Standards, trust and long-term confidence
For Homère Debs, business development director at Uptime Institute, standardisation is fundamental to building investor and customer trust.
“The best way to achieve resilient digital infrastructure is to look at it layer by layer, connectivity, power, cooling, operations and apply internationally recognised standards at each level,” he said.
Uptime has seen increasing adoption of global data centre standards in Iraq, driven both by regulators and private operators. “When everyone works towards the same benchmarks, you create an ecosystem, not just isolated facilities,” Debs added.
Security perceptions are also shifting. While Iraq was long viewed as a high-risk market, panellists agreed that improving stability and regulatory clarity are changing investor sentiment. “We are seeing international capital returning,” Debs noted. “Connectivity has improved; power is the next frontier.”
From corridor to hub
As the discussion concluded, AlKubaisy summarised the opportunity ahead. Backbone infrastructure, while essential, is only the foundation. Competitive access, affordable pricing, reliable power and international standards must work together to transform Iraq from a transit corridor into a regional digital hub.
“What we are seeing today,” he said, “is not just infrastructure being talked about, but digitalisation being delivered.”
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