Brookfield, Ontario Pension Fund To Acquire Compass Datacenters
After months of speculation, data center developer Compass Datacenters has a new owner.
Brookfield Infrastructure Partners and the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, an existing investor in Compass, are jointly acquiring the hyperscale campus specialist from RedBird Capital Partners and the Azrieli Group, the companies announced Tuesday.
Expected to close by the end of the year, the deal follows reports of a bidding war for the Dallas-based data center firm between Brookfield and digital infrastructure fund DigitalBridge, with Compass valued at over $5.5B.
“The industry is at a critical inflection point today with AI and cloud demand continuing to fuel significant growth,” Compass CEO Chris Crosby said in a written statement. “With Brookfield Infrastructure and Ontario Teachers’ strategic expertise and deep financial resources, Compass is ideally positioned to meet growing demand for hyperscale data centers and campuses.”
Founded in 2011, Compass has been one of the fastest-growing data center developers, with facilities either delivered or under development at 17 sites in the U.S., Europe and Israel. Compass specializes in developing and designing facilities for hyperscale tenants — generally tech giants like Microsoft, Google, Amazon Web Services and Meta. The firm’s management, including Crosby, will continue to head the company following the transaction.
Compass is one of two companies planning massive campuses in the controversial Northern Virginia development known as the PW Digital Gateway. The firm is in the final stages of approval for the project, which would see Compass build 11M SF of data center space near the Manassas battlefield in Prince William County and has sparked a wave of community opposition.
This isn't Brookfield’s first foray into the data center space. The company says it owns 50 individual data centers globally and owns a handful of data center firms in Europe, India, Latin America and New Zealand, either wholly or as a partner in joint ventures.
RedBird Capital Partners is unloading its stake in Compass after first investing in 2017, a deal it made jointly with the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. Israeli investor Azrieli Group acquired its 20% stake in Compass in a 2019 deal valued at $172M.
