TikTok is spending €1B on a second Finnish data centre
April 8, 2026 – 10:20 am
TikTok is investing €1 billion ($1.16 billion) to build a second data centre in Finland, the company announced on Wednesday. The new facility will be located in the Kiverio district of Lahti, a city of around 121,000 people in southern Finland. It will have an initial capacity of 50 megawatts and a potential total capacity of 128 megawatts. Construction is expected to be completed within a year, with the centre operational by 2027.
The Lahti investment is the second in Finland and part of Project Clover, TikTok’s €12 billion European data sovereignty programme designed to store and process the data of more than 200 million European users on European soil.
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TikTok’s first Finnish data centre, in Kouvola, is due to come online by the end of 2026. Currently, European user data is held with enhanced safeguards across three sites in Norway, Ireland, and the United States. The company has positioned both Finnish investments as steps toward removing European data from US-hosted infrastructure entirely.
A delicate moment
The announcement comes at a sensitive time. ByteDance, TikTok’s Chinese parent company, narrowly avoided a US ban in January over data protection concerns. In Europe, regulators and governments are increasing pressure on social media platforms regarding children’s safety, making the company’s commitment to billions in European infrastructure both a business need and political calculation.
On the same day as TikTok’s Lahti centre announcement, Greece revealed it would ban children under 15 from social media altogether from January 2027, with its prime minister advocating for similar measures across the EU.
A mixed response in Finland
The political reaction in Finland has been varied. While some welcome the investment as substantial for a city of Lahti’s size, others have expressed concerns.
Finland’s defence ministry approved the first data centre investment in 2024 without informing elected politicians. Wille Rydman, then minister of economic affairs, publicly called for the project to be “reconsidered,” citing security concerns and a lack of transparency around TikTok’s plans. He told Finland’s public broadcaster Yle that he hoped TikTok’s local property partner would reconsider hosting the company.
Despite these differing opinions, Finland has emerged as an attractive location for large-scale data centre investments due to its cool climate, access to low-cost renewable energy, and stable regulatory environment. Major operators including Microsoft and Google have already set up shop there.