NEXTDC Announces $2 Billion AI Factory and Technology Campus at Fishermans Bend
Melbourne, Australia: NEXTDC (ASX:NXT), Australia’s leading data centre-as-a-service provider, today announced a $2 billion (AUD) commitment to develop M4 Melbourne — a next-generation digital campus at 127 Todd Road, Port Melbourne.
M4 will feature an AI Factory, Mission Critical Operations Centre, and Technology Centre of
Excellence. Purpose-built for sovereign AI, HPC, advanced manufacturing and deep tech, the
campus strengthens Australia's competitive edge across the Five Eyes and positions Victoria as a
national digital infrastructure hub.
“This isn’t just a data centre — it’s critical infrastructure for Australia’s AI future,” said Craig
Scroggie, CEO and Managing Director NEXTDC.
Located on the former Westgate Park Printing Complex, once home to the nation’s largest
newspaper presses, M4 marks the shift from printing stories to producing intelligence.
Built for the AI Era
NEXTDC’s Fishermans Bend campus brings together three core facilities:
Planned infrastructure highlights include:
“M4 has been designed to meet the five critical imperatives for Australia’s AI future — speed,
scale, sovereign capability, sustainability, and security,” said Scroggie.
Positioning Australia in the Global AI Infrastructure Race
Image: NEXTDC CEO Craig Scroggie and Victorian Minister for Economic Growth and Jobs Danny Pearson
Designed as a regional hub for hyperscale AI, defence workloads, and sovereign systems, M4
strengthens Australia’s position in the global AI infrastructure race — delivering secure,
sustainable, and future-ready capacity at scale.
“Compute is the new electricity,” said Scroggie. “Just as electricity powered the industrial age,
sovereign AI infrastructure will power the next one.”
Premier of Victoria The Hon. Jacinta Allan commented: “This investment means thousands of
jobs, training for the next generation of tech workers, and cements Victoria's reputation as the
centre of innovation. We’re open for business, and we’re backing Victorians every step of the way.”
National Impact: Jobs, Innovation, and Sovereign Capability
M4 is expected to support thousands of high-value jobs across AI, digital infrastructure, defence
technology and advanced research. The campus will be a national platform for secure cloud,
sovereign AI, and mission-critical digital workloads — enabling Australia to grow its AI economy.
The Hon. Danny Pearson MP, Victorian Minister for Economic Growth and Jobs; Minister for
Finance, welcomed the announcement: “This project will create high-skilled jobs and lay the
groundwork to support future developments in AI, advanced manufacturing and defence. We are
working hard to attract and grow these opportunities, which are creating a thriving and globally
competitive tech sector, right here in Victoria."
“Digital infrastructure is economic infrastructure,” said Scroggie. “AI factories are a new class of
infrastructure, purpose-built for the industrial-scale production of tokens. M4 is a generational
investment in capability, resilience, and sovereign leadership — the infrastructure that will underpin
Australia’s economic competitiveness in the fourth industrial revolution.”
Building the Precinct Economy of the Future
M4 will anchor the Fishermans Bend Innovation Precinct — a nationally strategic hub for advanced
manufacturing, aerospace, sovereign defence, and deep tech. NEXTDC is proud to be working
with:
“Precincts matter. They create the gravitational pull for investment, innovation, and talent,” said
Scroggie. “By anchoring M4 at Fishermans Bend, we’re activating a nationally integrated
ecosystem for industrial AI, defence, research, and deep tech.”
“No one builds the future alone. M4 will be the convergence point for partners shaping Australia’s
AI era — from NVIDIA’s global leadership to our top-tier universities, to defence leaders building
sovereign capability. This is where intelligence infrastructure, collaboration, and execution meet.”
The Hon. Harriet Shing MP, the Minister for Development Victoria and Precincts commented:
“This major investment by NEXTDC is another clear signal to the world that Fishermans Bend is a
key industry and market centre for growth and in-demand industries, which in turn is driving jobs
and economic growth for Victoria.”
ENDS
Quotes from Fishermans Bend Precinct and Alliance Partners:
Quote attributable to Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research & Innovation and Vice President, Distinguished Professor Calum Drummond AO of RMIT University: “We support the Victorian Government and NEXTDC’s initiative in advancing The Fisherman’s Bend Innovation Precinct as a future Technology Campus for the development of key technologies needed to ensure Australian companies and knowledge-exchange institutions, including universities, keep pace with the rapid innovations in AI and emerging technologies more broadly.”
Quote attributable to Professor Gary Rosengarten, Director, Sustainable Technologies and System Enabling Impact Platform (EIP), of RMIT University: “This investment positions Australia at the forefront of sustainable innovation—leveraging our world-class research in energy systems, the built environment, and sustainability to create a resilient, net-zero data centre precinct that seamlessly integrates next-generation computing, AI, and secure large-scale data storage.”
Quote attributable to Professor Regina Crameri, Victorian Defence Industry Advocate, Victorian Government: "NEXTDC’s role as an anchor tenant in Fishermans Bend will bring cutting-edge data centre infrastructure to Victoria, strengthening the state’s defence and intelligence industry and accelerating critical skills in technology and security. This next-generation facility will serve as a national foundation for innovation, resilience, and technological capability in an increasingly digital world."
Quote attributable to Amanda Holt, Chief Executive Officer of SYPAQ a leading engineering and systems integration company based in Fishermans Bend: “The initiative the Victorian Government and NEXTDC are spearheading is much needed to support the development of critical and advanced technology businesses in Melbourne and surrounds. We look forward to becoming an active member of the Fishermans Bend Innovation Precinct and leveraging its growth to expand our business in Victoria.”
Quote attributable to Adam Evans, Co-founder, Anywise, a specialist Defence sector contractor and consultancy: “The establishment of the Fishermans Bend Innovation Precinct bodes well for business looking to expand their footprint in Victoria. It will deliver the sort of cloud and A.I. infrastructure that businesses like ours are looking to leverage. A.I. and high-level compute capability will increasingly become part of the products and service life cycle for many in the area and add scale and agility to sectors like Defence and other industries.”
Quote attributable to Stu Scotis, Agentic AI Leader Deloitte Consulting: At Deloitte, we believe Australia has a generational opportunity to lead on Sovereign AI. AI could be Australia’s next great export industry, one that could underpin our continued economic prosperity in the century ahead. But to get it right, we have to start with the basics: The power, the people, and the infrastructure. We believe that investments in facilities like this will create opportunities for Australian organisations, government departments and agencies to build the AI platforms and solutions critical to our sovereign AI capabilities.
Quote attributable to Mr Mike Johnson, CEO of Australian Industry and Defence Network (AIDN): "AIDN is looking forward to working with Defence Industry and Government to help realise the future potential of the Fishermans Bend Innovation Precinct."
Quote attributable from Andrew Leece, Co-Founder & COO of Sharon AI, a leading high-performance computing (HPC) business focused on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Cloud GPU Compute Infrastructure: “Building on our existing GPU deployments at NEXTDC’s Tier IV M3 (Footscray) campus, we look forward to collaborating with NEXTDC at the Fishermans Bend Innovation Precinct as part of the first dedicated “AI precinct” in Australia. This infrastructure is critical in enabling government, researchers and enterprise with unparalleled access to sovereign AI capability.”
Quote attributable to Dr Michael Harvey, Director of New Ventures, Quantum Australia: "This landmark investment in sovereign digital infrastructure reinforces Australia’s ambition to lead in emerging technologies. As quantum computing develops, access to high-performance computing, secure data centres, and colocation facilities of this calibre will be critical to our national capabilities. Quantum technologies also have a key role to play in securing the data infrastructure of the future, ensuring that Australia’s information and systems remain protected. While this is primarily an investment in AI, it opens new possibilities for collaboration across AI, quantum, and advanced computing, especially as companies like NVIDIA increasingly engage with Australia’s quantum sector."
Quote attributable to Jane Fitzpatrick, Chief Executive Officer, Australian National Fabrication Facility: “As a national leader in research infrastructure, the Australian National Fabrication Facility has seen first-hand what can be achieved when core capabilities are accessible to innovative people. The ROI from investment that supports research, development and translation efforts is undeniable and I hope that this announcement is the first of many that will answer the calls of industry for shared facilities that underpin new technologies and economic growth.
NEXTDC Media Team
nextdc@havasred.com
NEXTDC is an ASX 100-listed technology company and Asia’s most innovative Data Centre-as-a-Service provider. We are building the infrastructure platform for the digital economy, delivering the
critical power, security and connectivity for global cloud computing providers, enterprise, and
Government.
NEXTDC is recognised globally for the design, construction, and operation of Australia’s only
network of Uptime Institute certified Tier IV facilities, and the only data centre operator in the
Southern Hemisphere to achieve Tier IV Gold certification for Operational Sustainability. NEXTDC
has a strong focus on sustainability and operational excellence through renewable energy
sources and delivering world-class operational efficiency. Our data centres have been engineered
to deliver exceptional levels of efficiency and the industry’s lowest Total Cost of Operation through
NABERS 5-star energy efficiency.
NEXTDC’s corporate operations have been certified carbon neutral under the Australian
Government’s Climate Active Carbon Neutral Standard.
Our Cloud Centre partner ecosystem is Australia’s most dynamic digital marketplace, comprising
carriers, cloud providers and IT service providers, enabling local and international customers to
source and connect with cloud platforms, service providers and vendors to build complex hybrid
cloud networks and scale their critical IT infrastructure services.
NEXTDC is where the cloud lives®.