Blue Owl JV Obtains $2.3B for Data Center Project

January 23, 2025

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J.P. Morgan provided the financing in a deal arranged by Newmark.

Picture of a cloud modular data center — Crusoe uses modular data centers for cloud computing. *Image courtesy of Crusoe Energy Systems*

The joint venture of Blue Owl Capital, Crusoe Energy Systems and Primary Digital Infrastructure has obtained a $2.3 billion loan to capitalize a 206 megawatt build-to-suit data center development in Abilene, Texas. J.P. Morgan provided the note in a Newmark-brokered deal.

The three companies formed the $3.4 billion joint venture in October. Funds managed by Blue Owl’s Real Estate division and Primary Digital Infrastructure will jointly finance the 998,000-square-foot, two-building data center, which is being designed, developed and operated by Crusoe.

Oracle has already committed to the entire complex under a long-term lease, according to Data Center Dynamics. Occupancy is scheduled to commence in the second half of this year.

The project is part of Lancium Clean Campus, an 1,100-acre development that broke ground in late 2022 and was initially set to be a bitcoin farm. It currently has 200 megawatts of data center power capacity, with a total of 1,000 megawatts to be energized by the end of the year and an additional 1,000 megawatts in process.

Crusoe broke ground on the Abilene campus last year and is expected to deliver initial capacity in the following months. The site will also boast 300 megawatts of on-site self-generation. Once complete, the facility will be capable of running up to 100,000 GPUs on a single network.

The purpose-built data center is also set to include high-density data halls specially designed for AI workloads and use renewable energy sources, including nearby wind power. The design will support both direct-to-chip liquid cooling and air cooling.

Newmark Co-President Jordan Roeschlaub, Vice Chairman Clint Frease and Managing Director Ben Kroll, along with Head of Data Center Capital Markets Brent Mayo, secured the loan.

Data centers on the rise

Despite power constraints, the data center market is expected to continue to thrive, the expansion of AI applications being a major driver behind the growth. Global data center energy demand is set to double in the next five years to 100 gigawatts, according to a JLL report.

Texas had almost 440 completed data centers including colocation, hyperscale, cloud and enterprise data centers as of the third quarter of 2024, according to a LandGate Corp. report. That number is poised to grow, with two developments in the state already announced since the beginning of the year.

Earlier this month, Lincoln Property Co., Gigabit Fiber and Tradition Holdings formed a partnership to develop a data center campus in South Dallas. Dubbed GigaPop, the project will comprise more than 800,000 square feet across four buildings and will boast up to 540 megawatts.

Also in the Metroplex, Provident Data Centers formed a joint venture with PowerHouse Data Centers for the construction of a hyperscale campus in Grand Prairie, Texas, which is set to be one of the largest in the U.S. The first phase of the 768-acre project is expected to generate about 500 megawatts, while the entire campus will have 1.8 gigawatts of capacity at full build-out.