ESR Group Eyes Switch Datacenters Deal as $58 Billion Data Centre Funding Defies Tenant Risks
Updated
Updated · Financial Times · Jun 17
ESR Group Eyes Switch Datacenters Deal as $58 Billion Data Centre Funding Defies Tenant Risks
1 articles · Updated · Financial Times · Jun 17
Summary
ESR Group is in talks to provide debt or equity to Switch Datacenters for an Amsterdam-area site, despite investor resistance tied to tenant Telegram.
Telegram has raised lender concerns over alleged Russia links, content moderation and criminal use of the app, though one person said its lease could be ended within a few years and replaced.
Those concerns mirror broader financing frictions in the sector: some lenders avoided DayOne’s Finland project and Green Mountain’s Norway deal because TikTok or parent ByteDance were tenants.
Even with that scrutiny, data centre capital keeps flowing as AI and cloud demand surge, with Dealogic counting $58 billion across 42 transactions this year versus $34 billion across 34 deals a year earlier.
Must data center owners choose between lucrative deals with Chinese firms and the demands of Western investors?
As AI booms, are data centers the new battleground for global geopolitical influence?
With data centers now military targets, how can our digital world be defended from physical war?
ESR Group’s $7 Billion Data Center Expansion: Tenant Risks, Geopolitical Headwinds, and APAC Growth Outlook to 2031
Overview
ESR Group is considering acquiring Switch Datacenters in the Netherlands, a move that would introduce new operational and tenant risks. The datacenter’s infrastructure is planned for monetization by AlphaTON Capital Corp, offering advanced services like AI-as-a-Service and specialized inference for Telegram’s ecosystem. Although Telegram is not a direct leaseholder, its platform is a major target for these services, meaning ESR’s future revenue could be indirectly tied to Telegram’s usage and stability. This creates a unique risk profile for ESR, as the datacenter’s financial performance may fluctuate with Telegram’s operational needs and service consumption.