Australia’s top pension fund is boosting its A$40 billion ($25.8 billion) infrastructure portfolio by acquiring a significant minority stake in Vantage Data Centers Europe, Middle East and Africa (Vantage EMEA), a fast-growing hyperscale data center platform.
AustralianSuper is investing A$2.5 billion in the stake, marking the €180 billion fund’s first major foray in hyperscale data centers. But AustralianSuper is in good company, as Vantage EMEA is backed by DigitalBridge, which has amassed a $70 billion-plus portfolio of digital infrastructure assets over the past 25 years.
“Digital infrastructure continues to demonstrate its resilience as an asset class, and we look forward to building on our track record as we become a partner of choice to Australian investors seeking to increase their exposure to high-quality digital infrastructure investments,” said Jon Mauck, senior managing director at DigitalBridge.
As the name indicates, hyperscale data centers are designed to support large numbers — thousands or even millions — or physical servers and virtual machines. The global hyperscale data center market is estimated to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 26.44% between 2022 and 2027, reaching a value of $169.47 billion by the end of the forecast period, according to a recent Technavio market research report.
EMEA Vantage has been in operation since February 2020 and is currently present in six countries, including key financial and commercial hubs such as Frankfurt and Berlin, Milan and Zurich, Switzerland. The company recently expanded into the London market with 75 megawatt of IT capacity distributed across two campuses.
AustralianSuper and DigitalBridge-sponsored vehicles plan to support Vantage’s expansion across EMEA, using the company’s established campus development model to shorten time to market. “The Vantage EMEA platform will complement our existing digital infrastructure investments and this acquisition represents an important step for the fund as we build out our infrastructure capability in Europe,” said AustralianSuper Head of Infrastructure Nik Kemp.
Vantage EMEA is focused on environmental sustainability and has committed to reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2030. AustralianSuper is one of four major global pensions that banded together in 2020 to launch the Sustainable Development Investments Asset Owner Platform, which uses artificial intelligence to assess companies’ contributions to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter, subject to customary closing conditions.
