Carter Validus Acquires 2 Phoenix-Area Data Centers in $125M Sale-Leaseback Deal

By Keith Loria, Contributing Editor

In a $125 million sale-leaseback deal, Carter Validus Mission Critical REIT Inc. has acquired data centers in Phoenix and Scottsdale, Ariz., from IO.

CVMC REIT will own the real estate while IO, a data center technology, services, and solutions provider, will continue to deliver colocation and cloud services.

Phoenix data center acquired by Carter Validus Mission Critical REIT.

“We are excited about adding IO to our roster of strong data center tenants in our portfolio and look forward to our continued relationship with them,” Michael Seton, Carter Validus Advisors L.L.C.’s president and chief investment officer, said in a statement. “The quality of these two assets will be a great addition to our growing portfolio of high-quality mission critical assets.”

The transaction is the latest sale-leaseback between CVMC REIT and a service provider. Previous deals include three with AT&T and acquisitions of data centers operated by Internap, Peak 10, Atos and Equinix.

“IO New Jersey and IO Singapore employ a similar financial structure, so this latest transaction was intended to bring consistency across IO’s entire data center portfolio. It was part of our long-term strategic plan,” Anthony Wanger, IO’s president, told Commercial Property Executive. “This allows IO to concentrate our focus on what we do best: Operating world-class IO data centers for our customers.”

According to Wanger, it’s business as usual for IO, which will continue to focus on providing customers with colocation services.

“The sale-leaseback transaction is just one example of how IO is managing capital to best support its priorities,” Wanger says. “It unlocks the value in our real estate, increasing our cash on-hand that can be used to grow our primary business.”