Switch to Acquire Texas Data Center Operator Data Foundry for $420M Colocation sites in Houston and Austin will give Switch its first footprint in the strategically important Central US region.
Switch is adding Texas to its list of US data center campuses by acquiring Data Foundry, a colocation operator with data centers in Houston and Austin.
Las Vegas-based Switch said Monday that it’s agreed to pay $420 million cash for Data Foundry’s business – a 19x 2021 estimated EBITDA multiple. It plans to fund the transaction through a combination of cash on hand and either credit or new debt securities.
Austin and Houston will “anchor” Switch’s fifth “Prime Data Center Campus,” giving the company its first footprint in the strategically important Central US region. Companies building nationwide compute infrastructure tend to set up on west and east coasts and in Central US.
Press release content from Business Wire. The AP news staff was not involved in its creation.
Data Foundry Wins Landmark Appeal Against City of Austin in Texas Supreme Court Case Benefitting Texans
April 29, 2021 GMT
AUSTIN, Texas (BUSINESS WIRE) Apr 29, 2021
Data Foundry, a premier colocation data center provider with facilities in Austin and Houston, Texas won new rights for businesses and residents to challenge discriminatory rates imposed by municipalities in historic Texas Supreme Court decision against the City of Austin.
In 2016, Austin Energy, the City of Austin’s municipal power authority conducted a consumer rate review in which Data Foundry participated in. After the rate review completed, new rates were to be imposed beginning January 1, 2017. Recognizing that the rates were excessive and discriminatory, Data Foundry sued Austin Energy in Texas District Court. After the court ruled that consumers like Data Foundry cannot challenge rates set by municipal utilities
The Texas Supreme Court has affirmed a ruling that customers of an Austin city-owned utility can sue the city over its power rates, and revived several claims in the rate dispute that had been dismissed on jurisdictional grounds by lower courts.