Brookfield's Data Center Subsidiary Plans New Nashville Campus As Part Of Shift In Strategy

Brookfield subsidiary Evoque is planning a 100-megawatt data center campus near Nashville as the company shifts its business plan toward hyperscale facilities. 

Evoque Data Center Solutions plans to invest $200M in a new campus in Gallatin, Tennessee, about 35 miles from downtown Nashville, the company announced Thursday. The Brookfield-owned company will partner with Archer Datacenters on the project. Archer already operates a data center on the site, which sits next to a hyperscale campus being developed by Facebook parent company Meta. 

“The opportunity to expand into the Nashville market and to serve hyperscalers, cloud service providers, and large enterprises is exciting,” Evoque CEO Andy Stewart said in a release. “Archer … had great vision that has since been validated by Meta’s new data center, which is adjacent to our location. Evoque looks forward to maximizing the potential of this opportunity and to deliver more best-in-breed digital infrastructure solutions to more enterprises.”

The company's Gallatin campus will ultimately cover more than 61 acres, with over 500K SF of total data center space and over 100 MW of capacity. That footprint will incorporate a 28.5-acre site on which Archer already operates an 82K SF data center shell with 40 MW of available power. The nearby Meta campus spans 800 acres and has one operational data center, with more currently under development.  

Archer had previously floated plans for an expanded data center campus similar to what has been proposed through its partnership with Evoque, according to Data Center Dynamics. 

“With their commitment to operational excellence, sustainable energy capabilities, and forward-thinking leadership, we view Evoque as the ideal partner to help to realize our vision for the premier data center campus in the greater Nashville region,” Archer Datacenters CEO Jordan Milman said. “We look forward to continuing to champion this location alongside Evoque to create an attractive solution for both hyperscale and enterprise customers looking to scale in one of the most dynamic markets in the country.”

The Gallatin campus represents the latest sign of a shift in Evoque’s business strategy in recent months. Since its founding in 2018, when Brookfield bought AT&T’s data center portfolio in a deal valued at around $1.1B, Evoque’s business primarily focused on traditional retail colocation. But in April, the company announced it would begin focusing on so-called powered shell data centers — single tenant, built-to-suit facilities for the hyperscale market. 

In a recent blog post, Evoque officials cited opportunity in the renewable energy market as a primary reason for the shift in focus, and the company’s announcement of the Gallatin campus stated the facility would eventually run entirely on renewable energy. According to Data Center Frontier, Brookfield Infrastructure Partners, which is investing heavily in the data and renewable energy space, already owns a significant portfolio of renewable assets within the jurisdiction of the Tennessee Valley Authority, the utility that will supply energy to the project. 

In July, Evoque acquired California-based cloud advisory firm Fogorn, marking the company's initial pivot toward a market increasingly dominated by major cloud providers.