Digital Realty

Digital Realty Trust, Inc. is a real estate investment trust that invests in carrier-neutral data centers and provides colocation and peering services. As of December 31, 2019, the company owned interests in 225 operating data center facilities totaling 34.5 million rentable square feet in the United States, Europe, Asia, Canada, and Australia. The companies largest operating areas are: Northern Virginia, Dallas, Chicago, New York State, Silicon Valley, and London.[1]

Digital Realty Trust, Inc.
TypePublic company
NYSE: DLR
S&P 500 Index component
IndustryReal estate investment trust
Founded2004 (2004)
HeadquartersAustin, Texas, US
Key people
 Laurence A. Chapman, Chairman
A. William Stein, CEO
Andrew P. Power, CFO
ProductsData centers
Revenue $3.209 billion (2019)
$0.579 billion (2019)
Total assets $23.068 billion (2019)
Total equity $9.879 billion (2019)
Number of employees
1,550 (2019)
Websitewww.digitalrealty.com
Footnotes / references
[1]
Digital Realty data center in Markham, Ontario

The company is a member of The Green Grid and has helped pioneer concepts of energy efficient and energy conserving data center design.[2]

History

The company was formed in 2004 by GI Partners, which contributed 21 data centers that it acquired through bankruptcy auctions and from distressed companies at a 20–40% discount to replacement cost.[3]

On November 4, 2004, the company became a public company via an initial public offering.[4] At that time, the company owned 23 properties comprising 5.6 million square feet.[4]

In August 2006, the company acquired a property in Phoenix, Arizona for $175 million.[5]

By March 2007, GI Partners had sold all of its shares in the company.[3]

In January 2010, the company acquired three data centers in Massachusetts and Connecticut for $375 million.[6]

In January 2012, the company acquired a 334,000 square foot data center near Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport for $63 million in a leaseback transaction.[7] The company also acquired a data center in San Francisco for $85 million.[8]

In April 2013, the company acquired the data center of Delta Air Lines in Eagan, Minnesota for $37 million in a leaseback transaction.[9]

In July 2013, the company doubled capacity at its data center in Chandler, Arizona.[10]

In May 2015, the company sold a building in Philadelphia for $161 million that it acquired in 2005 for $59 million.[11]

In October 2015, the company acquired Telx for $1.886 billion.[12]

In November 2015, the company acquired 125.9 acres of undeveloped land in Loudoun County, Virginia for $43 million and announced plans to build a 2 million square foot data center on the property.[13]

In July 2016, the company acquired 8 data centers in Europe from Equinix for $874 million.[14]

In March 2017, the company announced a $22 million expansion of its data center in Atlanta.[15]

In September 2017, the company completed the acquisition of DuPont Fabros Technology.[16][17]

In 2018, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the company in Digital Realty Trust, Inc. v. Somers, a case in which Digital Realty fired an employee who had complained internally about the elimination of supervisory controls and the hiding of cost overruns. After he was fired, the employee sued the company, saying he was protected by whistleblower provisions in Dodd-Frank.[18] However the Supreme Court, citing specific language in Dodd-Frank, ruled that these protections only applied to whistleblowers who had first notified the SEC.

In December 2018, the company acquired Ascenty for $1.8 billion. At the time, Ascenty operated eight data centers in Brazil.[19]

In October 2019, Digital Realty announced the acquisition of European data center provider Interxion for $8.4 billion to “create a leading global provider of data centre, colocation and interconnection solutions”.[20][21]

In January 2021, Digital Realty announced that the company's headquarters relocation to Austin, Texas.[22]

References
  1. "Digital Realty Trust, Inc. 2019 Form 10-K Annual Report". U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
  2. Lohr, Steve (June 17, 2008). "Demand for Data Puts Engineers in Spotlight". The New York Times.
  3. "Digital Realty". GI Partners.
  4. "Digital Realty Trust, Inc. Completes Initial Public Offering" (Press release). GI Partners. November 4, 2004.
  5. Miller, Rich (July 27, 2006). "Digital Realty Buys Phoenix Internet Gateway". Data Center Knowledge.
  6. Clark, Ryan (January 5, 2010). "$375M Nets Data Center Portfolio". ALM.
  7. "Digital Realty buys data center near Hartsfield-Jackson". American City Business Journals. January 4, 2012.
  8. Sailors, John (January 4, 2012). "Digital Realty Trust buys S.F. data center for $85M". American City Business Journals.
  9. "Digital Realty Completes Second Sale/Leaseback Transaction With Delta Air Lines For Its Minneapolis Data Center" (Press release). PR Newswire. April 1, 2013.
  10. Ringle, Hayley (July 29, 2013). "Digital Realty Trust doubles capacity at Chandler data center". American City Business Journals.
  11. Kostelni, Natalie (May 6, 2015). "Center City building sells for $161M". American City Business Journals.
  12. "Digital Realty Completes the Acquisition of Telx" (Press release). PR Newswire. October 12, 2015.
  13. Clabaugh, Jeff (November 16, 2015). "Digital Realty plans second massive Loudoun data center". American City Business Journals.
  14. "Digital Realty Completes Acquisition of Eight Premium European Data centers" (Press release). PR Newswire. July 5, 2016.
  15. Karkaria, Urvaksh (March 15, 2017). "Data center operator Digital Realty plans $22 million Atlanta expansion". American City Business Journals.
  16. "Digital Realty Completes Merger With DuPont Fabros" (Press release). PR Newswire. September 14, 2017.
  17. "Digital Realty acquires DuPont Fabros in $7.8B deal". American City Business Journals. September 15, 2017.
  18. Lynch, Sarah N. (June 26, 2017). "U.S. high court to review scope of Dodd-Frank whistleblower protections". Reuters.
  19. "Digital Realty Completes Acquisition Of Ascenty". December 20, 2018.
  20. Patrizio, Andy (2019-11-05). "Digital Realty acquisition of Interxion to reshape data-center landscape". Network World. Retrieved 2019-11-16.
  21. "Digital Realty, Interxion to combine in BIGGEST data centre transaction EVER at $8.4bn". Data Economy. 2019-10-29. Retrieved 2019-11-16.
  22. Joshua Bote (January 20, 2021). "In mass tech exodus, yet another firm is leaving the Bay Area for Texas". Hearst Communications. Retrieved January 21, 2021.
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