Frankfurt area third-party Data Centre space is forecast to grow by over 34,0000 m2 of raised floor space

Research published by DataCentrePricing.Com shows that although long-established as the largest Data Centre market in Europe, "The London & the Inner M25 cluster region is set to be overtaken by Frankfurt as the largest Data Centre cluster in Europe. "

The latest edition of the bi-annual DataCentrePricing.Com Euro-Data Centre Trends subscription service - to be available in January - forecasts that third party Data Centre raised floor space in the London & Inner M25 and Frankfurt clusters stands at 264,000 m2 of potential space available in each city.

But, that, as the Frankfurt Data Centre cluster is set for significant extra growth over the next 12 month period – with some 11 Data Centre expansions announced by providers in the Frankfurt area including Colt Telecom, Digital Realty, Equinix, Interxion and Maincube – the Frankfurt cluster will soon overtake the UK’s largest Data Centre cluster to become the largest single city Data Centre cluster in Europe.

In total, Frankfurt area third-party Data Centre space is forecast to grow by over 34,0000 m2 of raised floor space - or approximately 60 MW of DCCP (Data Centre Customer Power) -during 2018. Frankfurt will overtake London to become the largest cluster in Europe by the beginning of 2019.

By contrast, the London & Inner M25 area cluster is forecast to add only an additional 10,300 m2 of Data Centre raised floor space - or approximately 20 MW of DCCP in total over the same period – with two notable London Data Centre expansions due to take place in 2018 (including VIRTUS London-5 at Stockley Park and Interxion London-3 at Brick Lane).

Frankfurt is seeing new third party Data Centre growth now for the following key reasons:

The availability of new space for expansion around the Frankfurt area – with new land for Data Centre development being acquired by Colt Telecom, Digital Realty and Interxion – with planning consent readily available for new Data Centre development.

* The attractiveness of Frankfurt as an international connectivity hub – with the man German Internet Exchange (DE-CIX) reporting daily IP traffic of over 5.9 TB as of September 2017, with the Frankfurt area also becoming a hub for connectivity in Germany and to other countries in the CEE region.

* The ease of adding incremental space to existing Data Centre facilities – as new Data Centre space is to be added by Equinix (at its FR2, FR5 & FR6 facilities) and by Interxion (at its FRA-11, FRA-12 & FRA-13 facilities) in the Frankfurt area.

By contrast, the London & Inner M25 region cluster is seeing a relative shortage of new land for Data Centre development when compared with Frankfurt.

Increasingly, Data Centre development is taking place outside of the London & Inner M25 area with Slough now becoming the largest Data Centre cluster outside London (including developments made by Cyxtera, Equinix, NTT Com, VIRTUS & Zenium) with over 100,000 m2 of Data Centre raised floor space available in the Slough area.