Generative AI (GenAI) is driving a surge in the mergers and acquisitions (M&A) landscape within the global datacentre market. In 2024, this sector saw an unprecedented $57 billion worth of M&A deals, marking a $5 billion increase from the previous record set in 2022. That year was significant, featuring two of the largest M&A transactions in datacentre history, each valued over $11 billion.
According to Synergy Research Group, the four biggest deals ever—CyrusOne, Switch, CoreSite, and QTS—took place in 2021 and 2022, each exceeding $10 billion. Fast forward to 2024, the biggest transactions involved sizable investments in Vantage Data Centers, which saw two deals totaling $9.2 billion. Additionally, Vantage secured $3.1 billion in equity to bolster its operations across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.
At this point, Synergy notes another $29 billion in M&A deals have been agreed upon but not yet finalized, with an extra “possible” $15 billion in potential transactions looming for the upcoming year. Since 2015, Synergy has tracked 1,498 datacentre M&A deals amounting to $300 billion. This tally includes not just acquisitions, but also minority equity investments, joint ventures, and land buys for future datacentre developments.
Private equity’s role in this M&A surge is striking. In 2020, it accounted for 54% of closed deal values. That number jumped to 65% in 2021, and it has remained between 80% and 90% since then. John Dinsdale, the chief analyst at Synergy, explains that earlier M&A activity largely stemmed from demand for cloud services and digital solutions. The advent of generative AI technology is now intensifying that demand.
Dinsdale highlights that many specialist datacentre operators struggle to fund necessary investments, creating an opening for private equity. The outlook for 2025 appears promising, with existing deals and potential transactions indicating another boom year ahead.
Synergy has published multiple studies recently emphasizing GenAI’s transformative influence on the datacentre market. Their latest findings reveal that the average size of hyperscale datacentres is growing to accommodate the heavy computational needs of GenAI workloads. Sales of datacentre hardware and software also hit record levels in 2024 as operators scrambled to upgrade their facilities and prepare for the AI demands ahead.