Italian wholesale fixed network provider FiberCop has announced plans to build more than 100 Edge data centers across the country.

The facilities will reside in former telecommunications exchanges throughout Italy. FiberCop said in a statement that one Edge data center has been activated in Italy’s capital, Rome, with new facilities to open shortly in Genoa, Bologna, Palermo, Turin, and Naples.

No information was released on the collective compute power of the network, or that of individual nodes. DCD has approached FiberCop for comment.

“Our exchanges are moving from network access points to become true innovation hubs, in which connectivity, computing power and storage capacity are integrated to support the country’s digital development,” said FiberCop’s chairman and CEO, Massimo Sarmi. “With this plan, FiberCop takes a further step forward in transforming its network infrastructure into an enabling technology platform, capable of supporting the growth of the Edge cloud, artificial intelligence and new digital services.”

Copper exchanges are premises used by telcos to facilitate voice calls and broadband services along copper wire networks. The emergence of superior fiber-optic cable solutions has triggered the widespread decommissioning or conversion of these facilities, including by FiberCop.

News that the firm intends to transform its exchanges into Edge computing hubs follows its trials of Edge cloud solutions in December 2025. FiberCop said that installing compute in its existing telecoms infrastructure would help bring computing power closer to its customers throughout Italy. In time, it added, the network would also help improve access for both businesses and governmental organizations to AI applications pertinent to healthcare, security, mobility, and public administration.

Founded in 2021, FiberCop manages a 28 million-kilometer (17.3 million-mile) fiber-optic cable network and 10,500 exchanges.

Its deployment of Edge nodes marks its first major foray into the data center market. It is not, however, the first telco to attempt such a venture. In January 2026, Telefónica España announced plans to convert its copper exchanges into a network of 17 Edge data centers, each with capacity of 1-2MW. That network was activated the following month, with five nodes brought online in the Spanish cities of Madrid, Bilbao, Seville, Valencia, and A Coruña. Ziply in the US has also converted a number of its old copper facilities into colocation sites.

Other operators, such as Telstra in Australia and Telus in Canada, are seeing their former exchanges redeveloped into residential buildings. Several exchanges belonging to BT/Openreach are being converted into hotels.

Learn more about the data center market in Italy and Southern Europe, and meet with other executives and experts from the region at the DCN Milan event next year.