Welcome to Global Data Center Hub. Join investors, operators, and innovators reading to stay ahead of the latest trends in the data center sector in developed and emerging markets globally.
In this week’s issue:
First, SB Energy filed to go public. The company holds 8.8GW of contracted capacity, 803MW under construction, and no operating data center. It issued about 4.0 million warrants to OpenAI at one cent and carries a $105 billion Nvidia residual-value guarantee. So, what is an investor actually buying when the tenant and the supplier both sit in the equity?
Then, the Nordics closed the cleanest deal of the week. CPP Investments and Equinix completed the $4 billion acquisition of atNorth, backed by a $4.1 billion financing package underwritten by European and Canadian lenders.
Finally, Tokyo repriced. Keppel DC REIT is paying JPY 168.4 billion for 88.62% of two Inzai City data centers, at a 2.1% discount to valuation.
Let us get into it.
When the Tenant Owns Part of the Landlord
The anchor tenant is now paid in equity, and that payment reaches the accounts before the rent does. SB Energy proved it on 1 September.
The company filed a Form S-1 to list on the Nasdaq Global Select Market and Nasdaq Texas under the ticker SBE.
It holds 8.8GW of contracted capacity and 803MW under construction. Not one data center is operational.
First data center revenue is expected in the fourth quarter of this year. To secure OpenAI as anchor tenant, it issued about 4.0 million warrants exercisable at one cent, with a board designation right for as long as OpenAI holds above 5%.
That warrant liability was reportedly worth $3.6 billion when issued in January and roughly $5.5 billion on 30 June, per draft documents reviewed by the Wall Street Journal.
First-half net loss came in at approximately $3.2 billion against about $140 million of renewables revenue. The tenant incentive is the largest single line in the loss.
So here is the discipline. Before backing an AI infrastructure landlord, ask what it paid its anchor tenant and whether that payment sits in rent or equity. If it sits in equity, the tenant’s upside and reported earnings move in opposite directions.
What the warrants cost, and what atNorth did instead, are below.
THIS WEEK BY REGION
The week’s biggest moves — what happened and what it signals.
North America
The supplier moved inside the capital structure twice this week. Anthropic signed a six-year, $35 billion cloud deal with Lambda, backed by Nvidia’s lease of the Hut 8 site and investment in Lambda. Lambda won the contract without sourcing or leasing the underlying facility.
SB Energy filed to list on Nasdaq under SBE with 8.8GW of contracted capacity but no operating data center. Vertiv agreed to acquire UtilityInnovation Group for $1.45 billion, plus up to $1.15 billion tied to earnings. Crusoe reportedly raised $3 billion at a $30 billion valuation.
Public markets equity investors get the first clean look at this structure when SB Energy prices, because the prospectus fixes numbers that reporting has only estimated.
Europe
The Nordics ran the week’s only conventional capital structure. CPP Investments and Equinix acquired atNorth for $4 billion, taking 51% and 34%, while Partners Group retained about 10%. A $4.1 billion lender-backed financing package supports the deal.
Cerebras began construction of a 165MW Finland campus, with each phase contracted before buildout. Meanwhile, UK planning faced opposition, including petitions against projects in Reading, Wales, and Scotland.
For infrastructure funds, the Nordic bid clears while the UK queue lengthens, and that gap is now a pricing input rather than a footnote.
Asia-Pacific
Japan repriced on rent, not scarcity. Keppel DC REIT is paying JPY 168.4 billion for an 88.62% interest, with JPY 190 billion total consideration at a 2.1% discount. Rents are at least 30% below market, making reversion the key return driver.
Bitdeer AI sold out its 9.5MW Malaysia facility, with expected AI cloud revenue above $800 million. Firmus signed a trans-Pacific deal with SUBCO and proposed a third Tasmania project, both without disclosed terms.
Real estate investors should read the Keppel entry price against the rent gap, because a 2.1% discount is not what makes that deal work.
South America
Brazil set the terms before the capital arrived. Brazil’s special data center regime was approved and now goes to the president. It suspends federal taxes on equipment for five years, against conditions on energy, water and domestic capacity.
Developers are moving on that. Yamna reserved land at the Port of Açu for a 250MW first phase, with no offtaker named and no capital disclosed.
Project finance institutions should watch the sequence, because a tax regime landing before the offtake decides which projects reach financial close.
PUBLISHED THIS WEEK
NVIDIA Did Not Buy Powered Land. It Bought The Design Standard. — The design standard lands during civil engineering, so a site built to one accelerator carries a redesign cost rather than a procurement cost.
KKR Is Not Behind MTN’s Africa Data Hub. Tarek Al Ashram Is. — Al Ashram funds the venture through his own investment firm, so the KKR-backed Gulf Data Hub balance sheet does not stand behind it.
What $725 Billion Cannot Buy (And Why the AI Buildout Now Waits on Electricians) — The schedule constraint is the electrical trade, and no volume of hyperscaler capex shortens an apprenticeship.
What a Data Center Actually Costs: CapEx Breakdown and the Drivers That Move It — Power and cooling capex shares, redundancy tier multipliers, air versus liquid economics, geographic cost spread, equipment lead times, cost per megawatt.
Sponsored By: Global Data Center Hub
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What the Warrants Cost
SB Energy paid for its anchor tenant in equity, and the filing shows the price. OpenAI holds about 4.0 million warrants exercisable at one cent, plus the right to designate a board member while it holds above 5%.
The vesting schedule says what the tenant is being paid for. One tranche of 408,942 vests on the conditions precedent to initial project financing for at least 753 MW-IT at Milam County. Five further tranches of 369,000 each vest only at equity values of $80 billion, $100 billion, $125 billion, $150 billion and $200 billion. Five of six tranches turn on the share price rather than on the space.
That liability was reportedly worth $3.6 billion at issuance in January and roughly $5.5 billion at 30 June, per draft documents reviewed by the Wall Street Journal. First-half net loss came in at approximately $3.2 billion against about $140 million of renewables revenue. The company holds 8.8GW of contracted capacity and 803MW under construction. Nothing is operational, and first data center revenue is expected in the fourth quarter.
Nvidia occupies the other side of the same structure. It committed $1.5 billion of non-voting Class N shares at the offering price, on top of a $1.5 billion prepaid forward entered on 17 August. It also guaranteed residual value across roughly 4.25GW of initial PORTS-Pike capacity, at an aggregate $105 billion, conditioned on Nvidia compute being the only compute deployed at that site.
Run the two questions and the second one fails. The first answers cleanly, because the payment to the tenant is disclosed, marked to market, and sitting in the loss. How long the comfort has to hold does not answer. The exclusivity condition on the residual-value guarantee carries no disclosed term, so a reader cannot tell how long the company is locked out of switching silicon. A missing disclosure is a finding.
So the document I am waiting for is the pricing prospectus on EDGAR. It fixes the per-share target behind every warrant tranche, and until it lands the largest liability on this balance sheet has no strike anyone outside the company can test.
NOTABLE TRANSACTIONS
Key structures and capital moves from this week’s deal tape.
Vertiv: approximately $1.45 billion cash for UtilityInnovation Group, with up to $1.15 billion contingent
Vertiv agreed to acquire Utility Innovation Holdings for $1.45 billion, with up to $1.15 billion in earnouts tied to EBITDA targets, shifting execution risk to the seller while securing behind-the-meter capabilities.
If you operate at scale, the mechanism is that speed to power is now bought as a product line, and the queue you were waiting in is what the acquirer is pricing.
Keppel DC REIT: JPY 168.4 billion for 88.62% of two Greater Tokyo data centers
Keppel DC REIT and Keppel are acquiring a 90% effective interest in Tokyo Data Centres 4 and 5 for JPY 190 billion, a 2.1% discount to valuation, funded largely by a S$625 million private placement.
For a listed landlord, the mechanism is rent reversion rather than entry discount, and in-place rents at least 30% below market are where that return actually lives.
atNorth: $4 billion acquisition backed by a $4.1 billion underwritten financing package
CPP Investments acquired 51% for $1.3 billion and Equinix 34% for $895 million, while Partners Group retained 10% for $260 million. European and Canadian lenders underwrote $4.1 billion for the transaction and expansion capital.
If you allocate to infrastructure, the mechanism is ordinary bank leverage against operating assets, and it is worth noting how unusual that has become in a week like this one.
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Have a great week.
— Obinna
That point about OpenAI’s warrants being tied mostly to SB Energy’s share price, not to delivered space, is hard to ignore. It makes the tenant incentive feel very different from normal lease economics. I also liked the simple test you gave: ask whether the payment to the anchor tenant sits in rent or equity. That seems useful well beyond this deal. If the biggest cost shows up through dilution instead of operations, investors can miss what they are really paying for.