The acquisition makes Equinix the market leader in Australia with 15 International Business ExchangeTM (IBX®) data centers nationwide. It expands the company's operations in Sydney and Melbourne, and provides a presence in four new markets: Perth, Canberra, Adelaide and Brisbane.
Digital transformation could add as much as A$45 billion (approximately US$35 billion) to Australia's gross domestic product (GDP) by 2021, according to new joint research from Microsoft and IDC1. The expanded Platform Equinix® will provide significant opportunities for Australian organizations to continue their digital transformation, and move their IT infrastructure, applications and services closer to the digital edge in proximity to global customers and partners.
The closure follows an agreement Equinix made with Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan in December 2017 to acquire all the equity interests in Metronode group of companies in an all-cash transaction for A$1.035 billion, or approximately US$804 million.
The Metronode assets add more than 860,000 square feet (80,000 square meters) of land, 90 percent of which is owned, to the global portfolio of Equinix. These sites add approximately 215,000 square feet (20,000 square meters) of gross colocation space in Australia.
The acquisition adds to Platform Equinix two data centers in Melbourne, and three in greater Sydney (including one in Illawarra), meeting customer demand for dual sites in each metro for redundancy and to host their data in network-rich, hyperscale ready facilities. It also adds two data centers to the Equinix portfolio in Perth, and one in each of Canberra, Adelaide and Brisbane, enabling businesses in Australia to locate their data in multiple sites across the country.