Blue Owl’s Beale to Break Ground on $3B Data Center Campus
This development represents the first hyperscale project of its kind in Kansas.
Beale Infrastructure, a portfolio company of Blue Owl Capital, is set to officially break ground on the first phase of its data center campus in De Soto, Kan.
The development value is estimated at $3 billion and is one of the largest private investments in Johnson County.
This represents the first hyperscale data center campus to be developed in the state. Official groundbreaking is scheduled for May 2026, while first-phase completion is planned for 2029.
Beale’s data center campus is supported by its partnership with Evergy, the largest electric utility provider in Kansas. The City of De Soto Wastewater Services and The Rural Water District 7 will provide water services.
READ ALSO: Who’s Funding the Data Center Boom?
Beale’s De Soto campus will be occupied by a large technology company through a long-term leasing agreement, according to the company.
Beale’s development plans went through some changes. In August 2025, the De Soto City Council entered into a development agreement with the company, including an intent to issue as much as $50 million in industrial revenue bonds, according to Kansas City Business Journal. At the time, plans called for four data center properties totaling 1.1 million square feet. Earlier this month, Beale filed plans to expand the project to 2.9 million square feet. However, the City of De Soto has not yet formally approved the proposal.
The development site is roughly 285 acres and is situated south of K-10 highway and nearly 45 minutes southwest of Kansas City International Airport. It is located within the former Sunflower Army Ammunition Plant, now a site undergoing large redevelopments, including Panasonic’s EV battery manufacturing plant.
The first phase will consist of at least two facilities and infrastructure. When completed, the De Soto data center campus will include four buildings totaling more than 1 million square feet as well as supporting facilities.
Overall, the development will generate long-term public revenue for the city and surrounding taxing jurisdictions. During the Industrial Revenue Bond tax abatement period, the project will make Payments in Lieu of Taxes on a per-square-foot basis. Once the abatement period expires, the project will become fully taxable. Additionally, the De Soto data center campus will produce electricity franchise fees, now capped at $5.5 million annually, with gradual increases over time.
Beale is privately founding the project’s major infrastructure features, including power delivery, site improvement and water systems. The first phase will add hundreds of construction related jobs as well as 50 operational jobs in the local community.
Kansas City metro development on the rise
As of the second half of 2025, the Kansas City metro had 277 megawatts in operation, according to a recent report from Cushman & Wakefield, with an additional 320 megawatts under construction in hyperscale capacity. The planned projects pipeline in the metro could add up to 2.3 gigawatts in total capacity.
Kansas City, a tertiary market serving local data center demand, is expected to continue its growth after Meta’s delivery of its $1 billion project. The 1 million-square-foot campus is within Golden Plains Technology Park, a 5.5 million-square-foot data center campus, in Kansas City’s Northland submarket.
A recent development in the metro is Metrobloks and Lincoln Property Co.’s high-performance data center campus. The multi-phase project will total 568,000 square feet and 150 megawatts of initial capacity.
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