Snapshot: Layer 9 Data Centers’ massive Mexican project

Increasing competition in the heated Latin American hyperscale datacenter segment, Arizona-headquartered newcomer Layer 9 Data Centers is working on critical infrastructure, power and land acquisitions to mark its market entry, targeting initially Mexico.

As part of its push, the datacenter solutions provider, which was founded in 2020, held a series A round, led by Mexico-City based investors DuPont Fabros, CPG, and LBS Power to support its expansion plans.

Proceeds will be used for phase 1 of a massive 64MW hyperscale site in Bajío region, planned to be ready for service in the third quarter of 2023, the company said in a statement.

Layer 9 Data Center’s so-called Project Falcon is divided into two phases, each with 32MW in capacity. According to the company, resources raised to date are enough to cover land purchases, power purchase agreements (PPA) and part of the critical infrastructure for most of the works.

Projected capacity is twice that of Odata’s QR01 hyperscale site, deemed the biggest hyperscale project to date in Mexico. Its first phase went live last month with 8.4MW of installed capacity.

The Layer 9 project’s capacity is also significantly higher than that of Ascenty's 36MW Vinhedo 2 facility in Brazil, considered the biggest single site in the region, while Ascenty is Latin America’s largest datacenter provider.

Investment and series A details were not disclosed, but according to market rumors, Layer 9's Project Falcon would be budgeted at over US$775mn.

In January, Layer 9 secured a PPA granting access to 100MW of power. The agreement included exclusivity rights and secured options to acquire additional land and power capacity, in a second region of Mexico near Monterrey, the company said.

“We are privileged to announce the closing of our highly anticipated series A equity financing, which was oversubscribed and backed by a highly accredited investor group within the digital infrastructure sector, including LBS Power,” CEO Michael Ortiz said in the release.

“With this capital, we look to launch our entry into Latin America, delivering hyperscale datacenter solutions within the country of Mexico catered to cloud service providers.”

The deep-pocketed newcomer joins a list of big players, including Ascenty, Scala, Odata, Equinix and KIO, with hyperscale projects for cloud providers launched or underway in Mexico. The country has turned into a datacenter hotspot, with most facilities concentrated along the Querétaro-Mexico City axis.

Bajío region encompasses Guanajuato and Querétaro, which has become a major datacenter area for hyperscale operators and global cloud service providers such as Microsoft and Amazon Web Services. 

Layer 9 was created by industry executives with hyperscale development and prefabricated US-based infrastructure experience. According to the company website, it is focused on delivering “a CSP-friendly and attractive datacenter topology.”

The group also said it has expertise in supporting hyperscale and wholesale datacenter operators, naming DuPont Fabros, Digital Realty Trust, Equinix, and Microsoft as customers.

 Picture source: Layer 9 Data Centers