The newest firm to enter Chicago’s bustling data center real estate market: T5 Data Centers. We spoke with T5 EVP Craig McKesson, one of our panelists at Bisnow's 5th Annual Data Center Boom, 7am Sept. 13 at the QTS Chicago Data Center, about T5’s entry into Chicago and where it’s going from here.

T5 made waves a couple of weeks back with the purchase of a 208k SF data center in Elk Grove Village from Forsythe Technology. Craig (pictured with wife Kim during a recent Portuguese vacation, and their friend Marcus photobombing the pair) says the ability to achieve speed-to-market with Class-A product in a power-constrained marketplace drove the company’s decision to buy the asset. The deal included an adjacent 4.5-acre lot where T5 will eventually build a second data center to accommodate growing demand.

It’s a statement entry into one of the country’s premier data center markets. The new T5@Chicago facility is a true purpose-built enterprise data center with significant electrical capacity and ability to customize infrastructure across 128k SF of available space, capable of delivering up to 9 MW of critical power. The second data center will add another 20 MW.

Craig believes the quality of the new T5@Chicago data center facility, flexible solutions offerings, and T5’s operational excellence and focus on customer service will give the firm a competitive advantage in a highly competitive Chicago market highlighted by new facilities like QTS’ Chicago data center and Digital Realty Trust’s Franklin Park data center campus, which recently announced it was expanding.

It’s T5’s first Midwestern foray, complementing its national portfolio of data centers across eight US markets, including Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles, Charlotte, Portland, New York and Colorado Springs. The company also has new expansion projects in the works in Dallas and Portland to meet surging demand in those markets. To learn more, attend Bisnow's 5th Annual Data Center Boom, 7am Sept. 13 at the QTS Chicago Data Center. Register here.