Further M&A activity is likely within the data centre sector, according to its biggest player Equinix.
The market has already undergone significant consolidation in recent months.
Equinix announced in May that it would acquire Telecity Group for US$3.6bn. In July, Digital Reality then struck a deal to buy Telx for US$1.89bn.
“I think it is likely we will see more [consolidation] as the next couple of years unfold,” Equinix UK managing director Russell Poole told Mission Critical Power.
Growth
The Telecity deal will dramatically increase the scale of Equinix’s European business and Poole said the firm’s challenge for the next 12 months is to manage the pace of growth.
Beyond that, Poole said Equinix sees “no end to the scope for growth on consumer-based activity” as a result of increasingly connected devices and objects, the so-called internet of things.
“We see [the internet of things] as another burgeoning market, another explosion in demand,” he said. “We are going to be talking a lot more about that in the coming months.”
Energy of things
Equinix is also in the early stages of working out how it could help balance the UK power grid, according to Poole. The UK energy system operator, National Grid, recently outlined plans to balance the power system by asking more businesses to respond to signals and power up or down rather than being over-reliant on power stations adjusting output.
Poole said Equinix “has something on the horizon that we are not yet able to talk about.” However, he said it would not be a near term development.
“I would say we are in the R&D phase of that at the moment,” said Poole. “It is certainly a very interesting area for us.”
- A full interview with Russell Poole will be published in the forthcoming print issue of Mission Critical Power. Click here to see if you qualify for a free subscription.
