Infratil Limited has committed to an investment of up to £120-130 million in data centre developer Kao Data.
Infratil’s investment will help fund Kao’s recent agreement to acquire two UK data centres, on long-term anchor lease from a large financial services business. Kao’s expansion will increase its potential capacity to approximately 55MW.
Following this initial investment, Infratil will hold a 40% stake in Kao Data, alongside current shareholders, Legal & General Group and Goldacre, which will both retain their 30%.
Infratil CEO Jason Boyes said, “With global demand for connectivity continuing to rise, this is an excellent opportunity to expand our digital infrastructure portfolio and build on our successful data centre platform investment in Australia and New Zealand. We were an early mover into this sector, acquiring CDC Data Centres in 2016, which has delivered exceptional performance.
“Kao Data provides a compelling strategic growth opportunity for Infratil. It is a rare opportunity to be able to invest in one of the fastest growing data centre markets in the world, alongside blue chip partners. We will bring our sector experience alongside our partners’ capability and relationships to continue to scale up this business, with the aim of delivering a sizeable multi-site platform.”
Lee Myall, CEO at Kao Data, added, “I welcome today’s announcement of Infratil Limited’s investment in Kao Data, and on behalf of our management team, we look forward to working with them on the next stages of this exciting journey. This investment presents a strategic opportunity to accelerate our mission of supporting the computing requirements of advanced industries, and to do so sustainably.”
