European asset manager Aermont Capital has submitted the highest binding offer for Spanish data center operator Nabiax.
Citing people familiar with the matter, Reuters reports Nabiax’s current owners, Asterion Industrial Partners and telecoms operator Telefónica, received binding offers this week as part of an ongoing sale process.
Goldman Sachs Infrastructure and Igneo, two companies previously linked to a potential sale, are reportedly also among final bidders. A final decision is yet to be made.
The companies all declined to comment to the publication.
Reports that Telefónica and Asterion were exploring a sale surfaced last year, and then again in May of this year. A potential sale figure of $1 billion has previously been reported for the operator.
Nabiax was formed by Asterion Industrial Partners in 2019 after it bought 11 data centers from Telefónica for €550 million ($616m). The deal totaled 29MW across the US, Latin America, and Spain. Nabiax was then created to offer colocation and hosting services across Spain and Latin America.
In May 2021, Telefónica announced it had sold a further four data centers to Asterion Industrial Partners in exchange for a 20 percent stake in Nabiax: two facilities in Chile and two Spanish sites in Madrid and Terrassa.
Last year, Asterion and Telefónica began selling off parts of Nabiax, with Actis acquiring 11 of its data centers in Latin America in March 2023.
Today, Nabiax currently lists three data centers on its website; two in Madrid and one in Barcelona.
Aermont is an asset management business focused on real estate investment in Europe. To date, the company has raised European investment funds and vehicles with total equity commitments of around €13 billion.
Keppel acquired a 50 percent stake in Aermont earlier this year, and is set to acquire the remaining 50 percent by 2028. Keppel CEO Loh Chin Hua recently said the company was set to expand its data center footprint in Europe through Aermont. Keppel currently operates European facilities in the UK, Germany, Ireland, Italy, and the Netherlands totaling 100MW of capacity.
Part of First Sentier Investors, Igneo manages $16.5bn in mid-market infrastructure assets across Europe, North America, Australia, and New Zealand. The company has previously invested in New Zealand telco Tuatahi First Fibre and US data center firm US Signal.
Goldman Sachs' digital infrastructure investments include Polish data center operator Atman, Iowa Internet services providers (ISP) ImOn Communications, Global Compute, and Brazil’s Elea Digital.
Others said to have had an interest in Nabiax include Wren House, Antin Infrastructure Partners, Blackstone, Brookfield Asset Management, CDPQ, DigitalBridge, EQT, Omers, PFA, and Vauban Infrastructure Partners.
