Balfour Beatty Investments, an investor, developer and operator of Public-Private Partnership projects in the UK, US, Canada and Australia, has announced that it has reached financial close for the Entreprise Data Centre Borden Expansion PPP project in Ontario, Canada, with Defence Construction Canada.

Balfour Beatty and Forum Equity Partners will invest approximately C$5.4 million (US$4.2 million) each into the project, representing 50% of the equity required.

The PPP project is a C$322 million (US$246 million) contract to design, construct, finance and provide facilities management for a new 10,000 m2 data centre located on the Canadian Forces Base in Borden, Ontario. Construction is expected to commence in June 2016 and the first of four phases of the new facility will be completed in fall of 2017.

Construction services will be delivered by Walsh Canada, architectural services by WZMH, engineering services by Ehvert Mission Critical, and facilities management by Brookfield Global Integrated Solutions over the 25-year concession period.

Manulife provided senior debt financing to the EDC Project by way of a private placement. 

Ernst & Young was financial advisor to Forum and Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) acted as arranger and underwriter.

The project is a new, modern and secure facility being procured to consolidate more than 400 existing data centers throughout the Provinces. The ultimate owner of the facilities will be Shared Services Canada.

Commenting today, Chris Arthur, senior vice president for Balfour Beatty Investments Canada said:

“This project represents a meaningful win for our organization since this is the first of a potential pipeline of P3 projects for the Canadian Department of National Defence, and a demonstration of continued growth of our business in this key market. We look forward to working with such a respected group of partners who have a well-established presence in the data centre sector.”