Element Critical, a data center operator backed by Safanad and Industry Capital, today announced that it has completed the acquisition of vXchnge’s TX-01 data center in Austin, Texas, which it will rename Austin One. Specifically, Element Critical’s purchase encompasses an existing 62.3k sqft data center, with 7 megawatts of critical IT load. Additionally, the Austin One data center can add a further 6 megawatts of power capacity, to reach 13 megawatts of power capacity in the near-term.
For vXchnge, today’s announcement closely follows the company’s sale of its CA-01 data center campus in Santa Clara, California to Cologix in April 2021.
Element Critical – Austin One
Element Critical’s Austin One facility is situated in the northern part of Austin, Texas at 8025 North Interstate Hwy 35. As a result, the data center resides ~12 miles from Austin-Bergstrom International Airport.
Growth Potential
Element Critical’s Austin One building sits on 6.9 acres (299k sqft) of land.
The facility includes a newly completed 2-megawatt data hall, which brought the data center’s existing capacity up from 5 megawatts to 7 megawatts of critical IT load.
Also, Element Critical plans to add ~6 megawatts of additional utility capacity over the next 1 to 2 years to meet Austin’s growing demand for data center space.
Connectivity
Austin One is capable of delivering sub-10-millisecond latency to 70% of Texas through its 10 on-site carriers. Specifically, these carriers include AT&T, Cogent Communications, Charter Communications, Grande Communications (Astound Broadband), IX Reach (BSO), LOGIX, Lumen Technologies, Megaport, Unitas Global, and Verizon.
Customers
Presently, Element Critical’s Austin One houses 60+ enterprise customers.
History
In August 2017, vXchnge purchased the Austin, Texas data center from Digital Realty’s entity Digital Norwood Park, LLC for $20m. More recently, in 2021, the property’s appraised value was $20.7m.
Element Critical – Data Center Portfolio
Element Critical operates six data centers in Austin, Houston, Silicon Valley (Santa Clara), Northern Virginia (Vienna), and Chicago.
Texas Data Centers
For Element Critical, the purchase of vXchnge’s data center in Austin, Texas marks the company’s second data center investment in the state, with its other facility located in Houston, Texas. Together with its 26-megawatt Houston data center, Element Critical can support workloads and provide disaster recovery services between both Texas locations.
Transaction Advisors – Element Critical and vXchnge
Element Critical, Safanad, and Industry Capital’s legal advisors were Greenberg Traurig and Shearman & Sterling.
vXchnge’s financial advisor was Bank Street Group.
Austin, Texas – Data Center Market
Notable data center operators in the Austin, Texas data center market include CyrusOne and Switch Inc – the latter entering the city through its $420m acquisition of Data Foundry in June 2021. Additionally, LightEdge operates two data centers in the Austin market with 21 megawatts of power capacity.
CyrusOne
As of Q2 2021, CyrusOne operates 18 megawatts of available critical load capacity across 106k sqft of colocation space in Austin, Texas, which was 69% leased. Specifically, these properties are:
- Austin II: 7 megawatts of available critical load capacity across 44k sqft of colocation space, which was 83% leased. Overall, the data center generates $15.6m of annualized rent
- Austin III: 11 megawatts of available critical load capacity across 62k sqft of colocation space, which was 58% leased. Overall, the data center generates $23.1m of annualized rent
Additionally, in Austin, Texas, CyrusOne holds 22 acres (958k sqft) of land available for future development.
Switch Inc
Switch’s Austin, Texas campus includes three facilities with 9.7 megawatts of power capacity and expansion capabilities up to 44.2 megawatts. Presently, Switch is building-out a 3-megawatt data hall in Austin which will be ready for customer deployments in Q4 2021.
Furthermore, Switch has a planned development of its Austin 4 facility. This will comprise 23 megawatts / 1.6k cabinets of power capacity across 280k gross sqft. Finally, Switch targets Austin 4 to be ready for customer deployments in 2024.
