Mitsui buys 20MW hyperscale data center in Japan for new investment fund

Japanese conglomerate Mitsui is spending 18 billion Yen ($121 million) to acquire a hyperscale data center as the seed asset for a new digital infrastructure investment fund.

The company is making the purchase via a subsidiary, Mitsui & Co., Realty Management (MBRM), and will become a partner in a holding company that operates the data center.

Mitsui will own 50 percent, with the rest of the shares held by unnamed institutional investors.

Few details of the facility have been released, but it is said to be an operational 20MW data center in Japan’s Kanagawa prefecture.

A Mitsui statement described the acquisition as “a seed asset which will be included in a data center fund to be newly established together with institutional investors in and out of Japan.” This is “part of Mitsui’s plan for further expansion of its data center business.”

It continued: “After the acquisition, there are plans for asset management operations to be entrusted to MBRM as with previous hyperscale data center development projects.”

Mitsui has a sizeable presence in the data center market, particularly in Asia Pacific. In January 2023, it partnered with real estate asset management firm Patrizia to set up a new investment fund targeting infrastructure in APAC.

Companies operating data centers in Kanagawa include NEC. Last year, the firm was said to be considering the sale of its facility in the prefecture as part of an effort to raise $500 million.