CIM Group, an owner, operator, and developer of real estate and infrastructure assets, today announced that it has made an incremental $355m equity investment into Novva Data Centers, a wholesale data center developer and operator in the Western United States. With this additional equity funding, CIM Group grows its total equity commitment for Novva Data Centers to $450m, following its initial $95m investment in 2019.
Novva Data Centers intends to use the proceeds from CIM Group’s equity injection to expand, by developing additional facilities across the United States – noting a “national expansion”. Ultimately, Novva seeks to offer a data center portfolio comprising 1,000 megawatts of power capacity by 2027. However, Dgtl Infra notes that this plan would require substantially more equity to complete, beyond CIM Group’s current $450m equity commitment.
Novva Data Centers – Overview
Novva Data Centers was founded in 2018 and is headquartered in West Jordan, a suburb of Salt Lake City, Utah. Presently, Novva has operational data centers in West Jordan, Utah, and Colorado Springs, a city located 65 miles south of Denver, Colorado. Additionally, the company is developing further capacity at both its West Jordan and Colorado Springs campuses.
West Jordan, Utah
Novva Data Centers’ flagship campus resides on 100 acres at 6477 Wells Park Road in West Jordan, Utah. This campus supports up to 180 megawatts of future utility power capacity at its substation, across 1.5 million sqft of data centers, built over four phases. Also, Novva states that its West Jordan, Utah data center can produce an annualized power usage effectiveness (PUE) ratio of 1.18.
In September 2021, Novva opened the first phase of its West Jordan, Utah campus, which offers 330k sqft of data center space.
Colorado Springs, Colorado
Novva Data Centers’ recently acquired campus resides on 37 acres at 650 Sybilla Lane in Colorado Springs, Colorado. This campus supports up to 40 megawatts of power availability with an annualized PUE ratio of 1.3. Presently, the facility offers 122k sqft of data center hall space and 55k sqft of office space.
In August 2021, Novva Data Centers committed $200m+ of total investment to expand its Colorado Springs data center.
Infrastructure Services
Novva Data Centers provides a combination of wholesale and multi-tenant retail colocation services. In turn, the company can serve customers at various deployment sizes – from 1 cabinet to 1k+ cabinets. Further, Novva aims to deliver “services to clients at the lowest possible cost”.
Also, Novva Data Centers offers build-to-suit (BTS) options, which can reduce a customers’ deployment timeline from a period of 36 to 48 months, down to 12 months.
Management
Novva Data Centers is led by Wes Swenson as CEO. Formerly, Swenson was the CEO of C7 Data Centers, an operator in the Salt Lake City, Utah market. Ultimately, C7 Data Centers was sold by its owner, Signal Peak Ventures, to DataBank in Q1 2017.
Additionally, Novva Data Centers’ founders have backed the company with ~$5m of funding.
CIM Group – Overview
CIM Group is a Los Angeles, California-headquartered owner, operator, lender, and developer of real estate and infrastructure with $29.7bn of assets owned and operated. The firm’s founders are Richard Ressler, Avi Shemesh, and Shaul Kuba. Additionally, Mitsui & Co., a Japanese financial conglomerate, owns a ~20% interest in CIM Group.
Overall, CIM Group’s infrastructure strategy targets the sectors of energy, digital, transportation/social, and waste/water management. Within digital infrastructure, CIM Group has been involved in the following data center investments to-date:
- 1547 CSR: owns data centers in San Francisco, California (400 Paul) and Toronto, Ontario (105 Clegg) in-partnership with 1547 CSR (fifteenfortyseven Critical Systems Realty)
- Cologix: CIM Group formed a joint venture with Cologix to construct and operate TOR4, a 15-megawatt / 50k sqft data center in Markham, near downtown Toronto
- Harrison Street: sold four data centers, located in the three U.S. markets of Chicago, Illinois; Orangeburg, New York; and Cheyenne, Wyoming to Harrison Street and 1547 CSR
