In what has become just the latest in a string of deals in the data center arena, DC BLOX has acquired Atlanta-based cloud solution provider Infrapoint.
Under terms of the deal, Infrapoint’s staff will join DC BLOX and its customers will be served by DC BLOX with an expanded range of services. Financial terms were not disclosed.
Infrapoint’s expertise includes managed hosting, petabyte-scale cloud storage, and disaster recovery solutions. That expertise should lend itself nicely to DC BLOX’s solution set of interconnected edge data centers, business continuity, and carrier class network services. The company’s high-speed network-connected data centers are located in multiple areas in the southeast.
"DC BLOX is excited to join forces with the Infrapoint team in meeting the IT infrastructure needs of businesses in the southeastern U.S.," said Jeff Uphues, CEO, DC BLOX. "Adding expertise in cloud infrastructure and services, an enhanced channel presence and a platform on which to build new solutions will give us a significant competitive advantage."
Infrapoint co-founder and CEO Chris Gatch will become DC BLOX’s chief technology officer, leading the company’s technology teams. Gatch’s previous experience was as a co-founder, executive vice president, and chief technology officer at Cbeyond, an Atlanta-based communications provider that grew to nearly $500 million in revenue before being acquired in 2014. Merrett Willett, co-founder and CTO of Infrapoint, will lead DC BLOX's cloud engineering team, the company said.
"The combination of DC BLOX and Infrapoint is great for our customers," said Gatch. "They will certainly benefit from added expertise as well as from DC BLOX's data center facilities. In addition, we're excited to be able to reach customers in new markets."
Data Center Deals
Even as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform battle in the public cloud services market, demand for third-party data centers continues to grow. Private equity firms and strategic buyers are eager for a bigger piece of that action. Data from Synergy Research Group showed companies spent more money on data center mergers and acquisitions in 2017 than in the two previous years combined, resulting in $20 billion worth of deals for the year.
This year the consolidation has continued. NTT Communications bought RagingWire Data Centers outright in February after already owning 80 percent of the company. ZenFi Networks & Cross River Fiber merged in April. Meanwhile, cloud and colocation data center provider Aligned Energy attracted a “significant” strategic investment from Macquarie Infrastructure Partners with an eye to attracting more MSPs to its data centers.
More often, large companies are outsourcing their data center assets as they shift focus to building out their IT capabilities. That’s opening up the playing field for providers to offer cloud services, colocation facilities, or other data center solutions. As a result, many experts believe we’ll see more data center M&A activity over the next five years as midmarket players look to grow while setting themselves apart from larger players like AWS, Microsoft and Google.
