The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) has begun moving out of a NextDC data center and into a CDC Data Centres facility.

First reported by ITNews, the migration aims to be complete by the next federal election.

The commission signed a contract with CDC Data Centres on July 2 for the next 10 years with the possibility of extending to 2036. The agreement is valued at almost AU$8 million (US$5.4m).

The contract overlaps the commission's previous one with NextDC by six months, enabling the migration process.

An AEC spokesperson told ITNews: “The AEC’s current contract with NextDC in Bruce (Canberra) was set to conclude as of December 11 2024, and therefore required a new market approach to be undertaken.

“The timing of the approach to the market was driven by the potential that the 24/25 federal election could be called in the second half of 2024, which would prevent any migration activities beyond September 2024 without generating significant risk to election IT operations."

According to the spokesperson, it has also been an opportunity to downsize its on-premise infrastructure. The AEC's current data center hosts its core WAN infrastructure, as well as internal business systems and election delivery systems.

The commission is seeking to invest in cloud computing as it reduces its data center needs.

The AEC has long been working on modernizing its IT operations. In late 2018, the commission announced plans to overhaul its 30-year-old core systems citing cyber security concerns. Two years later, the Aussie federal government dedicated then AU$96.7 million (US$65.3m) to start the process.

In 2022, ITNews reported that the core systems - including the roll management system and the general enrolment election support information system - would be replaced by a series of modular solutions that were likely to be hosted in a Microsoft Azure environment.

CDC has data centers in Melbourne, Canberra, and Sydney, Australia, and two in Auckland, New Zealand. In 2024, the company has signed major deals with the likes of the Reserve Bank of Australia and Western Sydney Airport.

In May 2024, the company filed for a 500MW data center campus in Sydney, Australia.

The following month, investment firm Infratil announced it was raising NZ$1.150 billion ($702.8m) to fund further investments into CDC’s growth.