More than US$5bn (€4.3bn) of capital has been raised in Asia Pacific so far this year, underscoring the strong attraction of data centres to global investors.
Singapore-based Princeton Digital Group (PDG) alone accounted for US$2.5bn. The company secured a US$1.3bn preferred equity investment from Stonepeak, alongside US$1.2bn in debt financing announced earlier this year.
Partners Group has also expanded its presence in the sector. In addition to acquiring GreenSquareDC in Australia, it purchased Digital Halo from ARCH Capital. Partners Group and ARCH Capital are committing about US$400m initially to support the platform’s development.
Keppel has closed the first round of fundraising for its Keppel Data Centre Fund III, raising US$580m from global institutional investors. The capital came from pension funds, sovereign wealth funds and asset managers, reflecting strong institutional demand for the asset class.
GIC is reportedly talking to the Goodman Group to potentially join its Australian data centre partnership.
The appetite for data centre exposure was most clearly demonstrated in Singapore with the listing of NTT Data Centre REIT. Its international placement attracted offers of more than US$2.2bn, nearly three times the US$773m targeted in the initial public offering. The trust, with a portfolio valued at about US$1bn, holds four stabilised assets and developments across the US, Austria and Singapore, and has a list of future projects.
The NTT REIT listing comes as a replacement for ESR Group, which was recently taken private by a consortium led by Starwood Capital. ESR’s delisting followed that of GLP, another pan-Asian logistics and data centre operator, which was privatised in 2018. Their exits have reduced the number of listed vehicles in the sector, limiting options for investors seeking public market exposure to data centres.
Today, the Asia Pacific market offers just a handful of listed data centre REITs — three in Singapore and three in Australia.
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