A joint venture of Mitsubishi Corporation and Digital Realty has opened a second data centre at the NRT campus in Chiba prefecture, growing the partnership’s portfolio to three facilities in Greater Tokyo and seven overall in Japan.
The new 34-megawatt data centre, dubbed NRT12, combines with the existing NRT10 facility to boost MC Digital Realty’s IT capacity to 73MW in the booming Inzai digital hub northeast of Tokyo, US-based Digital Realty said Wednesday in a release. The 50:50 JV also has a third project west of the capital in suburban Mitaka.
NRT12 spans 27,500 square metres (296,000 square feet) of floor space and offers high-density power of up to 70 kilowatts per rack, according to Digital Realty. The facility boasts air-assisted liquid cooling, low-latency networks and high-speed connectivity catering to the demands of machine learning, virtual reality, augmented reality and AI workloads.
“The launch of NRT12 marks a significant milestone for Digital Realty in Japan,” said Serene Nah, managing director and head of Asia Pacific at the global giant. “This new data centre, designed to world-class specifications, expands our capacity and strengthens our commitment to supporting the growing demand for AI-powered and scalable digital infrastructure in the Tokyo metropolitan area.”
Ventures on Two Continents
Aside from its trio of Greater Tokyo assets, MC Digital Realty owns four data centres at its 70MW KIX campus in Osaka, including the newest 21MW facility opened in February last year.
Mitsubishi Corporation and Digital Realty earlier this week announced a new joint venture to support development of a pair of data centres in northern Texas at an investment cost that could reach $800 million.
The Tokyo-based trading firm and the US company will own the two facilities in the Dallas metro area under a 65:35 JV, Digital Realty said Monday. The partners will commit a respective $265 million and $135 million to the projects’ 16MW first phase.
The two Texas facilities represent Mitsubishi Corporation’s first overseas venture in the data centre business. Nikkei Asia reported in 2021 that a sister company, Mitsubishi Estate, aimed to build seven data centres in the Washington DC area by the end of the decade at an estimated cost of JPY 200 billion ($1.8 billion).
NYSE-listed Digital Realty operates as a REIT and has more than 300 facilities in 27 countries. The Texas-based trust had $44.1 billion in assets at the end of December 2023, according to unaudited results.
Inzai Takes the Lead
Greater Tokyo became a 1-gigawatt data centre market in the second half of 2023 as operational IT load expanded to 1,028MW during the period, according to a Cushman & Wakefield report.
Inzai accounts for more than 83MW of the under-construction capacity totalling 266.5MW in Greater Tokyo, the agency said.
The Inzai projects under construction include the 27.5MW third phase of AirTrunk’s 300MW TOK1 complex and a 23.1MW stage at Colt’s 36.3MW Inzai 4.
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