(Bloomberg) — Two major data center deals with a combined equity value of $18.8 billion highlight the fast-moving consolidation of key cloud-computing assets ahead of a new generation of 5G and fiber-optic network services.
KKR & Co. and Global Infrastructure Partners agreed to acquire data-center owner CyrusOne Inc. in a transaction valued at roughly $11.4 billion. And American Tower Corp. agreed to buy CoreSite Realty Corp., in a deal worth about $7.4 billion for the data-center real estate investment trust, or REIT. Including assumed debt, the transactions will top $25 billion.
The deals add to a sweeping consolidation among REITs that manage data centers, the complexes that provide crucial infrastructure for companies big in cloud computing, such as Amazon.com Inc., Salesforce.com Inc. and Alphabet Inc. With Monday’s pair of deals, many of the independent data center companies have now found partners. Larger players such as Equinix Inc. and Digital Realty have also bulked up through acquisitions throughout the years.
CyrusOne, which specializes in the design, construction and operation of more than 50 data centers, will be closely held following the close of the transaction. Shares of the Dallas-based company rose about 4.1% to $88.99 at 9:38 a.m. in New York, just below the purchase price of $90.50.
For Boston-based American Tower, the takeover of CoreSite and its 24 data centers is a big step toward expanding beyond its wireless roots. The deal will pair American Tower’s extensive cell site and antenna tower holdings with the so-called edge data facilities where computing power extends further into mobile traffic networks.
“This puts us in a real special position from a competitive perspective,” Tom Bartlett, chief executive officer of American Tower, said on a conference call Monday. “We believe the transaction strengthens American Towers’ options to play and win at the edge of the 5G applications ecosystem.”
The offer price for CoreSite was $170 a share, and its stock rose 2.4% to $170.56 at 9:38 a.m. Shares of American Tower dropped 3.2% to $263.32.
The KKR deal for CyrusOne illustrates how private equity investors are seeing advantages in combining pieces and adding scale to prusue higher profit from sales to large-scale customers like Amazon and Google.
Real-estate investing giant Blackstone Inc. acquired data-center operator QTS Realty Trust Inc. for $10 billion including debt in August, in part to gain exposure to a hot sector.
— By Scott Moritz with assistance from Patrick Clark, Gillian Tan and Ed Hammond.
