There was a monumental £23.5 billion (€25.95 billion/$30.65 billion) investment into the data center sector for the first half of 2020, despite the impact of COVID-19, according to Knight Frank’s research. This is over four times the $5 billion annual average figure and a colossal increase on last year’s $2 billion investment volumes. Take-up in the first half of 2020 was also 50 percent higher year-on-year at 282 megawatts (MW).
The findings highlight the rise of the “Gigawatt markets” — data center markets where total supply of IT power is expected to exceed 1,000 megawatts in the next three years. Current Gigawatt markets are Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam and Dublin.
The report also highlights that Madrid, Copenhagen and Warsaw have emerged as the fastest growing European markets with over 700MW of enterprise hyperscale and build-to-suit developments between them in planning or active development. This comes as data center developments expand outside of
