Using two of the nation’s largest industries: commercial real estate and the burgeoning datacenter industry: a new national data centeroperator was formed. Headquartered in Dallas, Texas, the company (wholly owned by ASB Real Estate Investments / Real Estate Fund) will combine two of ASB’s arms: Dallas Infomart and Fortune Data Centers to make a newly minted and merged company: Infomart Data Centers.
Infomart Data Centers will begin with a mega-datacenter, located outside Washington, DC, and set to open in 2015. The new data center will have an estimated 2.2 million square feet when fully operational and pull 100-megawatts.
The venture is unlike anything attempted to date: combining commercial real estate and its buying and leasing power along with a datacenter with its buying and leasing power. When these to megawatt industries joined forces they literally created the ultimate datacenter: they have the ability to offer scalability on their own terms and custom-make a datacenter for its customers.
The facility will be located in Ashburn, VA – deep in the heart of data center alley and possibly the biggest hub of datacenter activity in the nation.
Infomart’s new datacenter will be a part of Dallas Infomart’s portfolio – including a 1.3-million-square-foot facility in Dallas, two inPortland, OR, and one in San Jose (currently the headquarters of Infomart Data Centers.
According to David Quigley, ASB’s CIO: “After building a national portfolio of some of the industry’s most successful data center properties, we reached a scale where it made sense to form an extremely well-capitalized operator, backed and owned by the fund, to manage our assets on a national basis in the best interests of our investors and tenants…”
The company also lured the former head of Fortune to act as preside of the new company. John Sheputis, had this to say about the new venture: “From four of the most important markets in the country, we are now positioned to serve the dynamic needs of our existing and future customers, who are often looking for extended location options with a trusted, highly capable provider…Our extended footprint sets a strong national foundation for anticipated future growth from existing tenants, new customers and the hiring of additional staff.”
Which, we always like to hear: the hiring of additional staff: it’s better for the clients, better for the economy and its just better business.
The new Infomart Ashburn datacenter was acquired from AOL back in August for about $34 million, the original facility is 14 years old and 180,039 in square feet, and will require extension renovations.
According to the technology research firm, Gartner, Inc, the datacenter market is expected to grow 4% this year, domestically and reach $156 Billion which is music to the data center industry’s and now the commercial real estate’s market’s ears.
