CyrusOne Kicks Off Third Massive Phoenix Data Center

CyrusOne announced it has started construction of a third building on its massive campus in Chandler, a Phoenix suburb, in a sign of strong demand in the Phoenix data center market.

Carrollton, Texas-based CyrusOne, entered the Phoenix market around the same time its previous owner Cincinnati Bell spun it off through a public offering more than two years ago. It entered the market with a bang, announcing plans for a campus that, at full build-out, can provide up to 1 million square feet of data center space and more than 100 MW of power.

The company completed the first building on campus in February 2013 and last October announced the launch of its second facility there.

The Phoenix data center market competes primarily with major West Coast data center hubs in California and the Pacific Northwest. A 2014 report by the commercial real estate services firm CBRE attributed growth in the Phoenix market primarily to low cost of power (in comparison to the other hubs), as well as recently passed data center tax breaks.

eBay has a data center in Phoenix, Apple is building one in nearby Mesa, and Microsoft is eyeing a data center build there, according to local news reports earlier this year. A number of major data center service providers (CyrusOne competitors) have facilities in the market as well, including local company IO, Digital Realty, CenturyLink, and Telx.

At 120,000 square feet, CyrusOne’s third Phoenix data center building will be smaller than the first one (about 150,000 square feet) but almost twice as large as the second one (about 60,000 square feet). Company leadership has not determined how much data center space or power will be available at the third building, according to a company spokesperson.

Phoenix I has close to 80,000 square feet of data center space built out and total power capacity of 28 MW, while Phoenix II has about 35,000 square feet of data center space and 6 MW. Whether the latest building will be called Phoenix III has not been determined.