BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE:IRM), the storage and information management services company, today announced that it has entered into an agreement to form a joint venture with Web Werks, one of India’s top colocation data center providers. Iron Mountain expects to invest $150 million over the next two years, and anticipates being the majority investor in the venture after the investment period. The first phase of the transaction is expected to close within the next 90 days subject to customary closing conditions.
Web Werks operates three Tier 3, carrier-neutral data centers, in Mumbai, Pune and Delhi NCR. This investment enables Web Werks to immediately expand its operations in its three existing markets and subsequently expand into Bangalore, Hyderabad and Chennai. Iron Mountain Data Centers is making this investment to support its existing hyperscale, network, content and enterprise customers looking to expand and scale in the rapidly growing pan-India region.
With a combined footprint of 225,000 square feet, Web Werks houses 6 worldwide Points of Presence (POPs), provides 4 megawatts (MW) of capacity, supports 6,000+ servers and supports 850+ clients. Web Werks also provides access to a robust, neutral interconnection ecosystem of carrier, content and cloud providers including over 160 Internet Service Providers (ISP) and 6 Internet Exchanges. As market leaders in hyper-connected data centers, Web Werks supports a broad base of well-known brands including: Enterprises, Banking, Financial Services, Insurance (BFSI), and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) who require the ability to efficiently and effectively scale their businesses.
“This investment reflects Iron Mountain’s commitment to invest in high growth, good return global markets to continue to meet our customers’ requirements. The India data center market is projected to grow rapidly in the coming years and we are excited to be an early mover into a market where the demand is high and the supply is low,” stated Mark Kidd, Executive Vice President & General Manager, Iron Mountain Data Centers. “Web Werks has a highly respected and seasoned leadership team and we are delighted to not only support their continued growth and success, but also to provide our existing Iron Mountain data center customers access to this growing and thriving market.”
India is the second-largest telecommunications market in the world. According to a recent report by JLL, India’s Colocation data center market size is expected to grow from 375MW in H1 2020 to 1,078MW by 2025, registering a CAGR of 21%. According to the December 2020, Global Data Centre Colocation & Interconnection report by Structure Research (SR), the Asia Pacific region will account for half of the global colocation market by 2025 driven by large emerging markets like India. The SR report also recognizes Mumbai and Pune as key opportunity markets in India with combined projected MW of built-out critical IT load capacity growth to reach over 470MW by 2025. “India provides an important next step in expanding our Asia Pacific footprint,” stated Michael Goh, General Manager Asia Pacific at Iron Mountain Data Centers. “We have seen very strong regional demand from our global customers following the grand opening of our Singapore data center, SIN-1, in 2019.”
“Joining forces with the Iron Mountain Data Center team will further solidify Web Werk’s leadership position in the pan-India region and among the broader set of global customers,” stated Nikhil Rathi, CEO, Web Werks. “Web Werks and Iron Mountain Data Centers are fully committed and aligned to grow and scale in order to meet the digital transformation and interconnection needs of our customers. The Joint Venture is expected to be among the select few data center operators with assets across all major cities and also have both Hyperscale and dense interconnection expertise. We look forward to the collaboration and continued success.”
Deutsche Bank acted as the exclusive financial advisor to Web Werks on the fund raise. Khaitan & Co and EY acted as the exclusive advisors to Web Werks respectively.
Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas and PWC India acted as advisors to Iron Mountain on this transaction. JLL acted as an introducing partner to both parties.
For more information please visit www.ironmountain.com/datacenters.
About Iron Mountain
Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE: IRM), founded in 1951, is the global leader for storage and information management services. Trusted by more than 225,000 organizations around the world, and with a real estate network of nearly 93 million square feet across approximately 1,450 facilities in 56 countries, Iron Mountain stores and protects billions of valued assets, including critical business information, highly sensitive data, and cultural and historical artifacts. Providing solutions that include secure records storage, information management, digital transformation, secure destruction, as well as data centers, cloud services and art storage and logistics, Iron Mountain helps customers lower cost and risk, comply with regulations, recover from disaster, and enable a more digital way of working. Visit www.ironmountain.com for more information.
About Web Werks
With a combined footprint capability of 225,000 square feet, Web Werks operates 3 strategically located Data centers in Mumbai, Pune and Delhi NCR along with 3 worldwide Points of Presence (POPs). Web Werks currently operates 4 megawatts (MW) of capacity supporting 6,000+ servers running 850 clients. Web Werks through its Data centers also provides access to a robust, neutral interconnection ecosystem of carrier, content and cloud providers including over 160 Internet Service Providers (ISP) and 5 Internet Exchanges. As market leaders in hyper connected infrastructure, Web Werks supports a broad base of well-known brands from Enterprise, BFSI, SMEs and OTTs who require the ability to efficiently and effectively scale their online businesses. For more information please visit www.webwerks.com.
Forward Looking Statement
Safe Harbor Statement Under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: This release contains certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and other securities laws and is subject to the safe-harbor created by such Act. Forward-looking statements include, but are not, limited to the anticipated closing of the transaction, the timing and size of additional investments, Iron Mountain's expected ownership stake and the expected value of the joint venture and future expansion growth in the region. These forward-looking statements are subject to various known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors. When Iron Mountain uses words such as "believes," "expects," "anticipates," "estimates" or similar expressions, it is making forward-looking statements. Although Iron Mountain believes that its forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, Iron Mountain's expected results may not be achieved, and actual results may differ materially from its expectations. In addition, important factors that could cause actual results to differ from Iron Mountain's expectations include, among others Iron Mountain's ability to close the proposed transaction in accordance with its terms, the risk that the conditions to completing the transaction will not be satisfied on a timely basis or at all and risks that we may not through the joint venture be able to achieve the expectations for the business and value based on challenges with the operations, risks in the market or gain the ownership or control we expect. Other risks described more fully in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including under the caption "Risk Factors" in our periodic reports or incorporated therein. You should not rely upon forward-looking statements except as statements of Iron Mountain's present intentions and of its present expectations, which may or may not occur. Except as required by law, Iron Mountain undertakes no obligation to release publicly the result of any revision to these forward-looking statements that may be made to reflect events or circumstances after the date hereof or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events.
