American data center company Aligned Energy is moving forward with growth plans after receiving what it calls “significant additional capital” in the form of a strategic investment from Macquarie Infrastructure Partners (MIP).
As a result of the deal, MIP will gain a controlling stake in Aligned alongside existing owners BlueMountain Capital Management. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Aligned is an infrastructure technology company offering colocation and build-to-scale solutions to cloud, enterprise, and MSPs. The company has facilities in Dallas and Phoenix, and recently announced a third 50 MW facility to be built in Salt Lake City starting in the third quarter of 2018. Combined, the company’s facilities can deliver up to 230 MW of critical capacity.
Aligned’s CEO Andrew Schaap says the investment provides enhanced financial resources to meet “substantial levels of current market demand.” While helping the company grow in its existing markets, the company is also looking at expanding into new markets thanks to the investment, according to Schaap.
MIP CEO Karl Kuchel says his firm took notice of Aligned’s success to this point. “The Aligned management team has extensive experience developing and operating data centers and has built two high-quality data centers that have strong leasing momentum with flagship customers,” he says. “We look forward to the partnership with the Company and BlueMountain, and to continuing the growth and development of the platform in existing and new markets.”
Data centers have attracted plenty of merger, acquisition and financing activity of late. One report from Synergy Research Group showed the value of data center-oriented M&A deals jumped to $20 billion in 2017, making it the biggest year for data center acquisitions.
Among the deals we’ve been tracking:
As larger companies begin to focus on building out their IT capabilities, they’re increasingly outsourcing their data center assets, be it cloud services, colocation facilities, or others. Many experts believe we’ll see even more data center M&A activity over the next five years as midmarket players attempt to scale while differentiating themselves from hyperscale cloud providers like Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform.
