Ardian, a private investment house based in France, has signed a binding agreement to acquire 100% of Verne Global, a data center platform diversified across the UK and Nordics, from Digital 9 Infrastructure plc (D9).
This acquisition builds on Ardian’s expertise in investing and managing assets across the digital infrastructure value chain. Ardian will support the company’s management team, led by CEO Dominic Ward, to deliver an ambitious expansion plan in the Nordics, one of the fastest growing regions for data centers supported by low-carbon energy and international connectivity. Closing of the transaction is subject to the receipt of merger control and foreign direct investment clearance which is expected by the end of Q1 2024.
Sustainability at its heart
Founded in 2012, Verne Global’s Northern European data center platform has experienced significant growth and now includes five data center campuses in London, Iceland and Finland. It provides highly specialised data center services for organisations running high-performance computing (HPC) workloads, notably AI, machine learning and Large Language Models (LLM).
Sustainability is at the heart of the company’s mission to help customers cost-effectively scale their digital infrastructure while reducing their carbon footprint. The majority of its data centers are powered by renewable energy.
Expansion plans across the Nordics
“We are absolutely delighted to become part of the Ardian platform, which has a team with deep expertise in digital infrastructure that will help accelerate our ambitious expansion plans across the Nordics", said Dominic Ward, CEO of Verne Global. "Verne aims to deliver sustainable data center solutions that enable organisations to cost-effectively scale their digital infrastructure while reducing their environmental impact. We are hugely excited to be working with Ardian and believe that we have the perfect partner to help power our future.“
“Verne Global has pioneered a sustainable approach to data centre management, using renewable energy and re-purposing existing sites to minimise its environmental impact. Ardian’s investment will support the management team at Verne Global to deliver an ambitious plan for its next stage of growth. With Ardian’s support, Verne is well positioned to capitalise on global digitalisation trends such as the accelerating use of AI and machine learning”, say Gonzague Boutry, William Briggs & Pauline Thomson, the Infrastructure team at Ardian.
“Verne Global continues Ardian’s strategy of investing in a balanced portfolio of infrastructure with scope for growth and attractive returns. This transaction further illustrates the capability of the Infrastructure team at Ardian to invest in large digital infrastructure assets in Europe. We look forward to working with the management team to deliver on the significant potential of the Verne Global platform”, said Juan Angoitia Grijalba & Benoît Gaillochet, Co-Heads of Infrastructure Europe at Ardian.
