New Data Center Developments: April 2024

The demand for new data centers isn't showing any sign of slowing. With new projects being announced each week, keeping track of the latest data center developments is not always easy.

To keep you informed about the latest data center news involving design, construction, and related developments, we bring you the highlights from the past month.

This curated selection will help you stay on top of the latest data center development news with ease.

North American Data Center Deals

Google has announced it is expanding its presence in the Midwest with a $1 billion investment that will include the company’s first data center in Kansas City, Missouri. 

In addition to the data facility, the investment includes a new power purchase agreement (PPA) with Ranger Power that will support 400 MW of new-to-the-grid carbon-free energy capacity. 

“Google’s selection of the Kansas City region is another example of our state’s ability to attract and support world-class companies,” said Governor Mike Parson. 

In other hyperscale news, Amazon purchased a 960 MW data center campus in northeast Pennsylvania from Talen Energy for $650 million. Known as Cumulus, the campus is located next to a nuclear power plant, offering an energy-hungry infrastructure with direct access to nuclear power.

Related:Data Center Construction Trends: Build Fast, Build Smart

As power consumption outpaces power production in the States, the Cumulus data center may offer a significant case study for renewable energy in the data center.

In Georgia, Microsoft bought nearly 21 acres adjacent to its existing Palmetto data center campus for $6 million, while Prologis, a major owner of warehouses across the US, announced a pivot from warehouses to data centers. Over the next five years, the company plans to invest over $25 billion in data center development projects.

Cloud provider OVHcloud has announced the opening of its second data center in Canada. 

Located in Cambridge, Ontario, the $107 million facility has a capacity of 10,000 servers and 2 MW of power. It will be accessible to OVHcloud US customers and will purportedly deliver improved latency compared to the existing OVHcloud data center near Montreal and the OVHcloud data center in Vint Hill, Virginia.

Staying in Virginia, Skanska has signed a contract with an as-yet-unnamed client to build a data center in the eastern US state. The $242 million deal will herald the development of a 23,000 sq.m data center across three halls.

Avant Technologies is building a micro data center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin as the company looks to capitalize on the demand for AI training infrastructure.

Related:New Data Center Developments: March 2024

More North American data center news:

European Data Center Developments

In Europe,  AtlasEdge has unveiled a new data center in the northern city of Leeds. “The new site provides connectivity, colocation, and cloud services in one of the UK’s fasting growing cities economically and an increasingly influential digital hub,” the company stated. 

Plans also appear to be moving forward for Kao Data’s 40 MW data center near Manchester. According to reports, a local planning committee is expected to green-light the company’s plans for a $440 million data center in the town of Stockport. Download Kao Data’s white paper for more details. 

Elsewhere, Equinix has revealed plans to transform a former industrial site in Slough, 20 miles west of London, into a data center campus. 

On the heels of announcing its first Paris data center and breaking ground on a 12 MW facility in Bangkok, NTT Data announced plans to construct a 26.6-acre data center campus outside of Berlin. The 96MW Brieselang campus will be NTT’s third Berlin-based data center.

Also in Germany, Sirius Real Estate sold its 37,830 sqm Frankfurt business park site to an unnamed data center developer for €40.1 million.

Asia-Pacific Data Centers Builds

In Asia-Pacific data center news this month, Yondr Group has energized its first campus in Malaysia, marking a significant milestone in delivering the site’s power infrastructure.

Located in Johor’s Sedenak Tech Park, the campus is set to deliver 300 MW of critical IT capacity when fully complete. It will see the development of multiple phases, with access to dark fibre connectivity, scalable utilities, and infrastructure. 

Lendlease and Princeton Digital Group have completed the construction of one of Japan’s largest data centers to date – a six-story, 48MW facility in the Greater Tokyo area.

Other Asia-Pacific data center news:

Middle East and Africa Data Center Investments

A slew of Middle East data center deals were announced at the recent LEAP tech conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Among the planned investments:

Staying in the Middle East, Zoho Corporation has announced the opening of two data centers in Saudi Arabia to ensure local data is stored within the nation’s geographical boundaries, in line with the Personal Data Protection Laws (PDPL).

Located in Jeddah and Riyadh, the two data centers are now fully operational. Zoho now has 18 data centers worldwide.

African data center firm Teraco has raised more than $100 million for the construction of a 120 MW solar plant and an 80 MW wind farm to support its operations in South Africa.