Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), a major Japanese utility whose service area includes Tokyo, has reportedly found a buyer for its large data center business, which it has been trying to sell for more than one year to pay off liabilities caused by the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident.

The buyer is Japanese security company Secom that currently operates five data centers in the country but wants to expand that part of the business, Japan Times reported, citing anonymous sources. Its data centers provide a total of about 110,000 sq ft of space.

Secom is planning to buy Tepco’s 80% stake in the power company’s data center business called At Tokyo, whose annual revenue is about ¥25bn. The buying price is about US$634m, or about ¥50bn, according to a Reuters report.

As we reported in July 2011, Tepco had been struggling to raise funds to cover liabilities caused by the nuclear-reactor accident at its Fukushima Daiichi power plant that followed the earthquake and tsunami on Japan’s eastern shore in March 2011.

At Tokyo offers data center, operation and network services. One of its four data centers in the Tokyo metro has as much as 1.5m sq ft of floor space.

If Secom’s acquisition plans are successful, its data center space inventory will increase about tenfold, according to Japan Times.

Tepco has another, smaller investment in the data center business: an 8% stake in KDDI, a telecommunications and data center services company. In July 2011, this stake was also on the list of planned divestments.