BlackRock-Led Consortium Buys Aligned Data Centers for $40B
Aligned owns 50 data center campuses across the globe, including two hyperscale facilities in Northern Virginia
By Nick Trombola October 15, 2025 1:05 pm
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The AI revolution is expensive, but a group of investors led by BlackRock aren’t shy to open their wallets.
The Artificial Intelligence Infrastructure Partnership (AIP), founded late last year by BlackRock, NVIDIA, Microsoft and MGX, bought Aligned Data Centers for $40 billion. The deal, which also included BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP), is aimed at funding next-generation cloud and AI computing infrastructure. Australia-based Macquarie Asset Management sold the equity.
Founded in 2013, Aligned has emerged as a leader in the data center space with more than 5 gigawatts of current and planned capacity across 50 global campuses. Aligned’s portfolio is found across Northern Virginia (which include two hyperscale campuses in Sterling and Ashburn), Chicago, Dallas, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Ohio, São Paulo, Brazil, Queretaro, Mexico and Santiago, Chile. The consortium — financially anchored by the Kuwait Investment Authority and Singapore’s state-owned Temasek Holdings — plans to accelerate that growth, though expansion details were not disclosed.
The deal is expected to close in the first half of 2026. Aligned will stay headquartered in Dallas with CEO Andrew Schapp at the helm.
“AI is reshaping every sector of the global economy,” Bayo Ogunlesi, GIP chairman and CEO, said in a statement. “By combining Aligned’s scalable, adaptable platform with AIP’s capital and capabilities, we will build the infrastructure to support innovation at scale.”
Aligned’s trajectory is emblematic of the sheer energy surrounding data center investment. The company earlier this year raised roughly $12 billion in capital, split between equity and debt, in one of the largest-ever private sector investments in a data center developer. Indeed, tech companies such as Microsoft, Amazon, Meta and others are expected to spend some $400 billion on AI infrastructure this year alone, according to Morgan Stanley.
Nick Trombola can be reached at ntrombola@commercialobserver.com.
