Equinix’s new $20M Data Center Expansion in Dallas

Equinix (Nasdaq: EQIX) has invested $20 million into expanding its data center complex at the Dallas Infomart.

The company, based in Redwood City, California, has added 40,000 square feet of collocation space to the complex with it new data center, DA7. The addition brings Equinix’s Dallas-Fort Worth footprint to 250,000 square feet.

The DA7 adds 40,000 square feet of collocation space to Equinix‘s footprint.

“Dallas has been a fantastic market for us,” said Karl Strohmeyer, president of the Americas. “The power of the Dallas market is that it is the largest hub in the south central United States.”

The new expansion helps Equinix ensure that it’s offering a premium collocation service to meet the demand of its customers, Strohmeyer said. The expansion will connect clients with direct access to 100 carriers, 40 cloud service providers and 30 content and digital media companies.

Already, the company has landed a Fortune 100 company that plans to deploy 200 cabinets, which is roughly about 1 megawatt of power, in the initial phase of DA7. That company, which Equinix could not name for security purposes, will use the fiber capacity, which will tie directly into the Infomart, to connect to Microsoft Azure. The data center will help support the company’s disaster recovery efforts.

Equinix said it plans to hire 17 additional employees to support the new center. Globally, the company employs more than 4,000 people.

Strohmeyer said the demand for the secured private connection of the cloud continues to grow. And with Dallas serving as a hub for major corporate headquarters, the need for such services in the region will continue to rise accordingly. Equinix also sees additional opportunities to capitalize on Dallas as a connector to Latin America.

“Proliferation of wireless continues to scale in South America,” Strohmeyer said. “Taking advantage of that in Dallas will be a key part of our investment.”

Equinix has six data centers in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. In June, it completed the DA6, for which it invested $34 million. The company also expanded to Plano Legacy Business Park, with an option to possibly build another data center on nearby land.