Atman, a key player in the Polish data center colocation market, has secured a groundbreaking $344M (PLN 1.35 billion) financing package to fuel its ambitious data center expansion plans. This financial injection, backed by six major Polish and European financial institutions, might mark the largest syndicated loan for data center development in the country’s history.
At the heart of this expansion is the construction of the new Atman WAW 3 campus located in Duchnice, near Warsaw, alongside enhancements to Atman’s existing colocation data centers. The financing would underscore a significant vote of confidence in Atman’s robust growth trajectory and its pivotal role in Poland and the broader Central and Eastern European (CEE) region’s data center sector.
Set to house over 50,000 servers across three buildings, covering a net area of nearly 19,000 square meters for IT equipment colocation, the Atman WAW 3 data center campus would represent a significant step forward in Atman’s growth strategy. The first phase of the project began in October 2023, with expectations to complete the initial building, boasting 14.4 MW of IT capacity, by the fourth quarter of 2024.
Wojciech Sadowski, Atman’s Chief Financial Officer, expressed his enthusiasm over the deal, highlighting it as a testament to the company’s solid market position and potential for future growth. “The excellent condition of our company has been recognized by domestic and foreign financial institutions in the form of loans granted, which will enable further dynamic development of Atman as a leading data center player in Poland and the CEE region.”
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Meeting ESG Criteria
The financing agreement goes beyond conventional financial metrics, incorporating stringent requirements related to energy efficiency and corporate sustainability. These ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) criteria would align with Atman’s strategic focus on minimizing energy consumption and fostering a positive impact on the economy, society, and the environment at large.
Doug Lane, Chief Financial Officer of Global Compute Infrastructure and a major shareholder of Atman, articulated his confidence in the data center project’s success in Europe. He envisioned the Atman WAW 3 campus as a flagship project for the group in Central Europe, paving the way for further data center investments in the region.
Slawomir Koszolko, Atman’s Chief Executive Officer, pointed to the timing of this expansion amidst a surge in demand for data center colocation services. “According to many industry analysts, we are on the verge of a major growth wave in the data center market. This demand is fueled by the burgeoning sectors of cloud computing and artificial intelligence technologies, with Poland increasingly becoming a favored location for major global IT corporations in the CEE.”
Since 2011, Atman has established itself as a dominant force in the Polish data center landscape. Currently, it would command a 15 percent market share in terms of net space for colocation, cloud, and dedicated server services, according to PMR reports. This recent financial milestone would not only reaffirm Atman’s leading position but also signify a bullish outlook for Poland’s role in the global tech ecosystem, promising enhanced data infrastructure and services for businesses across the region and beyond.
