American investment firm Stonepeak has announced that it will enter a strategic partnership with American Tower Corporation and acquire an ownership interest of approximately 29% in American Tower’s data centre business.
As part of the agreement, Stonepeak will invest in common equity and mandatorily convertible preferred equity in a 2.5 billion USD transaction, while American Tower will retain managerial and operational control and oversight over its data centre business.
In a press release statement, Stonepeak affirmed that the transaction would benefit both American Tower and Stonepeak, given high demand for low-latency, hybrid IT solutions, and agile interconnection across American Tower’s data centre campuses.
Transitioning to a Cloud-based Digital Infrastructure Model
Currently, American Tower’s data centre portfolio contains 27 data centres in 10 American markets, covering over 450 networks, 23 native cloud on-ramps, and over 35 000 interconnections.
Earlier in January 2022, American Tower had successfully closed its acquisition of CoreSite Realty, which operates 25 data centres, 21 cloud on-ramps, and over 32 000 interconnections across eight major US markets, in a deal worth approximately 10.1 billion USD.
American Tower’s President and Chief Executive Officer, Tom Bartlett, affirmed that “we are pleased to partner with Stonepeak in our U.S. data center business, where we expect to create value through growth in our highly interconnected, cloud on-ramp rich portfolio of data center assets. In Stonepeak, we’ve found a like-minded partner, with deep communications infrastructure experience and a long-term investment philosophy that aligns with the principles of American Tower and our longer-term strategy in the data centres segment.”
He added that “while this transaction supports the equity financing component for our previously completed CoreSite acquisition, it also creates a platform through which growth opportunities can be strategically evaluated and financed, with American Tower and Stonepeak committed to executing on opportunities as the 5G ecosystem continues to develop.”
Andrew Thomas, Managing Director and Co-Head of Communications at Stonepeak, expressed his support for the transaction, noting that “American Tower has established one of the premier network dense, interconnection-focused data center platforms in the U.S. through CoreSite and previous acquisitions, which we view as a great fit for our core infrastructure strategy.”
“The platform is strategically positioned to be at the forefront of the continued shift from a traditional centralized infrastructure model to a cloud-based, connected and distributed digital infrastructure model and we are excited to partner with the American Tower team to help accelerate investment behind this trend in the years to come.”
Stonepeak noted that it expects the transaction to close in the third quarter of 2022.
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