Data Center Investment News — 21/04/2023
DataBank to expand Seattle data center
DataBank is expanding one of its data centers in Seattle, Washington.
Announced this week, the expansion will more than double the raised floor space to 27,900 square feet (2,590 sqm) and increase available critical IT power to 3MW.
The company has set a target completion date of Q4 2023.
“We decided to expand our footprint in the Seattle area based on how fast its digital economy is growing,” said Tony Qorri, DataBank VP of construction. “Growing tech companies and emerging startups need cost-effective colocation solutions that easily integrate with other IT environments while also providing a strong security posture that meets compliance requirements. That’s exactly what our data centers deliver.”
Digital Edge breaks ground on new data center in Incheon, South Korea
APAC data center firm Digital Edge has broken ground on a new data center in Incheon, South Korea.
“Last week we celebrated the official groundbreaking of our SEL2 data center in Incheon,” the company said on LinkedIn this week. “We look forward to sharing more updates from the site as work continues to build the largest commercial colocation data center in South Korea.”
First announced in April 2022 and being developed in partnership with SK ecoplant, SEL2 will be a two-building, 120MW campus, with the first phase due to come into service in 2024.
The companies are to invest around one trillion won ($800m) in the project. SK ecoplant will develop the facility, while Digital Edge will operate it.
Aligned acquires office building in Chicago’s Elk Grove
Aligned has acquired an office property in the Elk Grove area of Chicago, Illinois. It’s unclear at this point whether the company aims to convert the CitiBank-occupied building into a data center.
Citing Cook County public records, the Real Deal reports Aligned was the buyer of 50 Northwest Point Boulevard in Elk Grove Village in March.
Franklin Street Properties announced the sale last month, but didn’t disclose the buyer. The 177,000-square-foot (16,450 sqm) office building, built around 2000 and sat on 10 acres, sold for $29.1 million.
At the announcement of the sale, Franklin Street CEO George J. Carter said: “We are pleased to announce the completion of the sale of the Property. We intend to use proceeds from the sale of the Property primarily for debt reduction.”
Keppel gets regulatory approval for floating data center park in Singapore
Keppel Data Centres has received approval to go ahead with its plans for a floating data center park in Singapore.
Announced in a series of responses to questions prior to the company’s annual general meeting, Keppel said: “We continue to make progress on our Floating Data Center Module. We have received approval from the regulatory authorities to proceed, and are currently in negotiations with the site owner for project deployment.”
The site owner was not shared, though the site in question was previously announced to be the Loyang Offshore Supply Base operated by Toll Group. Very few updates have been made about this since.
Keppel first started exploring the idea of building its own floating data center park (FDCP) in 2019, two years after the company invested $10 million in Nautilus Data Centers, a California-based startup building floating data center facilities.
Raxio Data Centres secures sustainability-linked debt facility of up to $170m
Raxio, Roha and Meridiam have secured a sustainability-linked debt facility of up to US$170 million in multiple tranches for Raxio Data Centres, a pan-African data centre developer and operator.
The financing package includes US$110 million from Proparco and the Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund (EAIF), a Private Infrastructure Development Group (PIDG) company.
The financing will enable Raxio to progress with its roll-out of data centre infrastructure across the continent.
Robert Mullins, CEO of Raxio Data Centres, said: “This is a momentous milestone for Raxio, and we are very excited to have found in Proparco and EAIF the ideal long-term partners, with common objectives and values.
LATAM’s Cirion plans new data centres in Peru, Chile and Brazil
Digital infrastructure and technology provider Cirion has released plans for the development of data centre assets in Peru, Chile, and Brazil.
The rollout includes a new data centre in Santiago’s Quilicura district, where it acquired a 25,000m2 plot of land, another in Macropolis in Lurín in Peru, and the third in Cotia in São Paulo.
In Brazil, the Argentinian operator also plans to expand the installed capacity of its Rio de Janeiro data centre.
Cirion was born as a result of Stonepeak’s US$2.7 billion acquisition of Lumen in 2022. The company operates 18 data centres in Latin America with total capacity of 40MW.
Quantum Switch appoints its first chief operating officer
Quantum Switch has named Mike Buckingham as its first chief operating officer (COO).
In his new role, Buckingham will oversee all day-to-day operations of the Quantum Switch business with a focus on delivery and creating robust, flexible structures that meet the demands of hyperscale tenants as well as local businesses and investors.
Prior to joining Quantum Switch, Buckingham worked for CBRE as managing director for the data centre solutions business across Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA). Before that he spent six years at Google where he led data centre construction in the Netherlands and was the regional lead for delivery of its cloud capacity in EMEA.
“Mike’s appointment is the next phase in this journey as we scale-up and create the foundations to become one of the most significant players in the industry. His experience, attitude and approach made him the standout choice to be our first COO,” said Tim Bawtree, founder and chief executive at Quantum Switch.
StratCap acquires data centers in California and Missouri
StratCap has acquired two data centers and a number of cell towers in the US.
The company, formerly Strategic Capital, this week announced that its wireless infrastructure division, StratCap Wireless, has completed the acquisition of more than $35 million in data centers and cell towers.
In California, StratCap acquired a purpose-built data center in Santa Clara that is 100 percent leased to a ‘top-tier wireless carrier,’ and serves as a network switch facility.
The company also acquired a newly-built data center in St. Louis, Missouri that is 100 percent leased to ‘two high credit quality tenants.’
Green Energy Partners plans to expand Virginia’s capacity with nuclear powered data centers
Green Energy Partners, a US data center and energy developer, plans to use nuclear reactors to power 30 new data centers in Virginia and provide Virginia with green hydrogen for data center backup.
Green Energy Partners (GEP) has proposed 30 new data centers on land next to the 1.6GW Surry Nuclear Power Plant in southeastern Virginia. While building the new facilities, GEP plans to also build multiple small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs), which will power green hydrogen production plants.
The site, midway between the Northern Virginia data center hub and the Virginia Beach cable landing station, would enable Virginia to expand its data centers beyond the highly developed Loudoun County area, where data centers are reported to use around 20 percent of available power, and power distribution issues have limited development.
GEP has bought 641 acres of land next to Dominion Energy’s Surry Nuclear Power Plant, which houses two 800MW pressurized water reactors (PWRs) built in 1972 and 1973. These have had their original operating licenses extended from 40 to 80 years, and are due to continue providing power until 2052 and 2053. Another two PWRs had originally been planned for the site.
Skybox offering 100MW build-to-suit campus in Plano, Texas
Skybox Datacenters is planning a 100MW build-to-suit data center campus in Plano, Texas in partnership with logistics real estate firm Prologis.
The site is owned by Prologis and was previously an NTT Data Services data center and office complex.
On its website, Skybox now lists Atlantic Station; a 64-acre, 100MW data center campus in northern Dallas able to house up to one million square feet (92,900 sqm) of data center development. The site includes an on-site substation, with 25MW available now.
Located at 2300 West Plano Parkway, the site was previously used by NTT Data Services. NTT Data acquired the complex in 2016 when it bought the former Perot Systems IT services operation from Dell in a deal valued at more than $3 billion. Dell had acquired the company in 2009 for $3.9 billion.
Brookfield-owned DCI tops out New Zealand data centre building
Brookfield wholly owned DCI Data Centres (DCI) has completed the first of two new data centres in Auckland as it continues its expansion across New Zealand.
The company, part of Brookfield’s Global Data Centre Platform, completed AKL01 which is set to be joined by a second site in Albany, AKL02, with a combined 50+ MW of critical technical power at full build.
DCI’s Chief Executive Officer – A/NZ Malcolm Roe said: “DCI is committed to a major investment programme focusing on cloud data infrastructure to serve the ever-increasing need to securely access and store data.
“It is fantastic to have delivered our first data centre in New Zealand which will address a critical capacity gap in the market and support the growth of the digital economy.”
Digital Realty $1bn Chicago data centre estate sale expected next week
US data centre REIT Digital Realty (NYSE: DLR) is reportedly close to selling a stake in its Elk Grove Village Campus (Chicago) which could generate proceeds of nearly US$1 billion.
According to a market note from Cowen and Company, LLC, the data centre operator has already lined up a private equity buyer for the campus consisting of three data centres.
In the note, signed by senior equity research analyst Michael Elias, he said Cowen expects the near-term announcement of a core joint venture (JV) concerning 95% stake which if it delivers on the estimated US$982.6 million price tag would represent an upside on DLR’s ~US$750 million target for Core JVs.
“We believe an announcement could come in conjunction with 1Q23 earnings,” the analyst said.
GI Partners acquires a fully leased data centre in Virginia
GI Partners, a private alternatives investment firm, confirms the acquisition of 43915 Devin Shafron Drive in Ashburn, Virginia.
The news supports the continuation of GI Partner’s strategy of acquiring and managing technology enabled real estate. The property is located on a highly networked 98-acre campus that is managed by an unnamed global data centre operator.
“This property is centrally situated within the largest and most important data center market in the country,” said John Sheputis, managing director and Patrick Lawler, director of GI Partners.
“The recent leasing velocity of Northern Virginia affirms the value tenants place on locating at the centre of the modern digital ecosystem. This network dense data centre is a great addition to our core investment programs and demonstrates our commitment to being a trusted counterparty in all circumstances.”
PE-backed French operator commissions two new data centres in Lyon
Private equity-grown Euclyde Datacenters has announced the commissioning of two new rooms on its DC 5 campus in Lyon.
The French data centre operator and hosting provider has invested more than €2 million (US$2.19 million) in the expansion.
The rooms can accommodate 140 bays and will enable customers to outsource their infrastructure and applications.
According to the company, the first 60 bays are already booked by “major players in the health and ESN sectors”.
EcoDataCenter plans 150MW data center campus Östersund, Sweden
Nordic data center firm EcoDataCenter is to develop a new campus in central Sweden.
The company this week announced plans for a new 150MW campus, known as EcoDataCenter 2, in Östersund, Sweden.
The campus will be constructed in phases, with the first 20MW completed in 2026.
“We are constructing a new growth platform for our clients that also enables us to take the next step in sustainable data center design. At EcoDataCenter 2 we will make a future-proof facility both in terms of sustainability but also from a technical perspective being able to handle very high densities,” said Dan Andersson, CEO of EcoDataCenter.