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Data Center Mid-Atlantic Submarkets Surge

Analyzing Site Selection and Expansion Opportunity In Mid-Atlantic Submarkets, as well as Infrastructure and Operations Driving Efficiency For Facilities Coming Online

Justin Puccio

Justin Puccio

Executive VP, Corporate Development

DataBank

Shannon Hulbert

Shannon Hulbert

CEO

Opus Interactive

Lane Anderson

Lane Anderson

EVP, Development & Strategic Procurement

QTS

Daniel English

Daniel English

Managing Partner

Legacy Investing

Phill Lawson-Shanks

Phill Lawson-Shanks

Chief Innovation Officer

Aligned Data Centers

Jeff Green

Jeff Green

Information Technology Communications Manager

Prince William County Department of Economic Development

Richard Muha
Moderator

Richard Muha

Service Account Executive

Boland

Justin Puccio

Executive VP, Corporate Development

DataBank

Mr. Puccio joined the company’s senior leadership team as Executive Vice President of Corporate Development in mid-2017 with a twenty year track-record of industry accomplishments. Mr. Puccio leads the company’s growth strategy and acquisition efforts. Prior to joining DataBank, Mr. Puccio served as a Director for Signal Hill, a tech-focused investment bank where he helped launch the internet infrastructure practice and managed several successful prominent industry transactions. Prior to Signal Hill, Mr. Puccio served as President and Founder of Satori Networks, Inc., a telecommunications research firm specializing in consulting services, industry research, and complex network builds. Mr. Puccio also possesses diverse expertise in wholesale and enterprise technology applications, carrier relations, and corporate management, which stems from his roles in regional executive management at OnFiber Communications and Eureka Networks, and sales with Level 3 and MCI. Mr. Puccio graduated from Middlebury College.

Shannon Hulbert

CEO

Opus Interactive

Ms Hulbert is CEO of Opus Interactive. Shannon has led the strategy and vision for the cloud provider since 2011. Prior to cloud, Shannon was in the utility energy-efficiency sector for 8 years. Opus Interactive is a hybrid and multicloud solutions provider with a dedicated FEDRAMP Moderate Ready IaaS/PaaS environment and can be found on the FedRAMP marketplace under OpusGov (OG). OG is housed inside of FISMA High faciliites, operated by screened US citizens. This environment is restricted to US federal, state, local and tribal governments, and their partners - backed by over 24 years of proven reliability in the commercial sector.

Lane Anderson

EVP, Development & Strategic Procurement

QTS

With more than 25 years of experience in mission critical construction and design, Lane Anderson has an extensive background in MEP projects and design and construction leadership. Having delivered over 3.5 million square feet of data center projects, Lane is well versed in designing for efficiency to pursue low PUE facilities and has strong expertise in building design and construction teams.

At QTS, he is responsible for Corporate Development, Construction, Design and Strategy, as well as Strategic Procurement.

Daniel English

Managing Partner

Legacy Investing

Daniel English is the President and Co-Founder of Legacy Investing, an investment firm focused on technology impacted real estate. Legacy has completed >$3B in transactions across 19M SF in data centers, e-commerce industrial assets, and life science buildings. Prior to co-founding Legacy Investing, Daniel was a tech start-up executive with leadership roles across M&A, corporate development, strategy, and product management. Daniel studied engineering at Carnegie Mellon University and Economics and Finance at Emory University.

Phill Lawson-Shanks

Chief Innovation Officer

Aligned Data Centers

With over 30 years of industry experience, Phill has played a pivotal role in shaping the future of data center infrastructure, network architecture, and cloud solutions worldwide.

As Chief Innovation Officer at Aligned Data Centers, Phill spearheads the identification of emerging trends and technologies, strategically leveraging them to shape Aligned's innovation roadmap. He's instrumental in cultivating a culture of creativity, driving the development of new products and partnerships that ensure the company remains both competitive and highly adaptable in today's rapidly evolving market.

Before joining Aligned, Phill served as Chief Innovation Officer at EdgeConneX, where he was instrumental in developing edge-based network data centers that underpin today’s digital content ecosystem. His career spans senior executive roles at Virtacore, Alcatel-Lucent, SAVVIS (now CenturyLink Technology Solutions), and MCI (now Verizon Digital Media Services), as well as Compaq/HPE.

Phill holds eight active technology patents and serves as a board member for organizations such as Netrality Data Centers, the Clean Energy Buyers Association (CEBA), and the Nomad Futurist Foundation. Known for his ability to distill complex technical concepts into actionable strategies, Phill is a sought-after speaker and advisor, recognized for his innovation and commitment to advancing sustainability in the digital infrastructure sector.

Phill’s unique journey—from his early roles in enterprise systems development and digital infrastructure to his leadership in global technology firms—reflects his passion for challenging the status quo and empowering the next generation of technology leaders.

Jeff Green

Information Technology Communications Manager

Prince William County Department of Economic Development

As Prince William County’s Department of Economic Development attraction lead for the Information and Communications Technology Sectors, Jeff Green appreciates working at the intersection of the private and the public sectors to improve a community. His work includes managing a burgeoning Data Center Industry as well as raising awareness of the diverse and talented IT workforce in Prince William County.

Jeff previously worked for the Montgomery County Economic Development Corporation, and started his economic development career starting his own economic development consulting business, where he served clients across 15 states. As a proud graduate of Ohio University and The Ohio State University, he enjoys golf, walking his dog, and watching Ohio State football.

Richard Muha

Moderator

Boland

Mr. Muha started as an intern with Boland Trane the summer of 2012 through the summer of 2014 working with the Estimation Department and Owner Sales group. In 2015 Mr. Muha was hired full time as a Service Project Engineer supporting the Owner Sales group development and manage service-related projects. For the last four years Mr. Muha has been an Account Manager with the Owner Sales group.

At Boland, Mr. Muha is responsible for Sales, Marketing and Solutions projects related to his clients with a focus on the vertical market of Mission Critical Data Centers. This includes all aspects of Account Management; including preparing Service Contract Proposals, Time Quoted Service Repair, Retrofit and Replacement work.

Mr. Muha also supports the development team in providing site survey, troubleshooting, design review, and retro-commissioning support. He has developed strong client relationships and gained client trust through his ability to solve customer problems and generate solutions offerings.

Lou Najdzin

Lou Najdzin

VP, Platform

Digital Realty Trust

Rick Galietta

Rick Galietta

Senior Director, Global Solutions Architects - Americas

Equinix

Lou Najdzin

VP, Platform

Digital Realty Trust

Lou Najdzin is a Senior IT Services veteran with a broad industry background ranging from leading Hosting & Network lines of business to leading product management organizations and launching new products. He currently leads a team responsible for Platform & go-to-market strategy activation. His team builds customer and product insight tools along with solution blueprints to assist enterprises with their digital transformation. Prior to joining Digital Realty, Lou spent 10 years at Equinix building tools to help drive Equinix from a product company to a platform company. Before joining Equinix, Lou was an Account Executive in Hewlett-Packard’s enterprise services business focused on Outsourcing opportunities with the largest institutions in the capital markets industry. Before HP, he led product management at Savvis – where he managed the team that launched their first cloud offering. Lou was a client partner at Telwares, Inc.; where he negotiated client vendor contracts for IT services. He also held various positions at AT&T and Lucent in professional services, product management, international operation, offer development and finance.

Lou holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Rutgers University, an MBA in Finance from Seton Hall University, and recently earned an Executive Certificate in Strategy & Innovation from the Sloan School of Management at MIT.

A Word From: Prince William County Department of Economic Development

Christina Winn
Opening Remarks

Christina Winn

Executive Director

Prince William County Economic Development and Tourism

Christina Winn

Opening Remarks

Prince William County Economic Development and Tourism

Christina Winn leads the Prince William County Department of Economic Development (PWCDED), catalyzing investment, retention, and redevelopment opportunities in the second largest county in Virginia.

By positioning the county as a leader in the fast-paced, evolving economy of the Greater Washington, D.C. region, Ms. Winn is shaping stages for expansion and collaboration in key target industries, such as life sciences and biotech; last-mile distribution and supply chain logistics; and government contracting. Her goal is to create higher paying jobs for a highly educated and diverse workforce in Prince William County that will also build capacity for a flourishing entrepreneurial ecosystem.

Since taking the helm of the department in 2019, Ms. Winn has implemented best practices and programs that attracted more than $10.3 billion in capital investment and 7,531 new and retained jobs. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she led multiple grant programs, providing more than $32 million in assistance to the county’s business community.

With more than 20 years of economic development and private sector real estate experience, Ms. Winn is an expert in development programs including finance, incentives, and marketing. She currently serves as the president for the Virginia Economic Developers Association (VEDA), and she was named to the Washington Business Journal’s 2022 class of Women Who Mean Business.

Ms. Winn strategically enhanced the county’s economic national presence with the rigorous International Economic Development Council (IEDC) department accreditation in 2022. The department programs have been honored with eight IEDC Economic Excellence Awards as well as a 2022 Achievement Award from the Virginia Association of Counties (VACo).

Previously, she led Arlington Economic Development business investment group from 2014 to 2019, where she was instrumental in redefining the Northern Virginia economic landscape with the recruitment of Amazon’s HQ2. She earned her master’s degree in real estate development from Johns Hopkins University and her bachelor’s degree in economics from Arizona State University.

Why This Matters

What You'll Learn: 

The Mid-Atlantic has been home to one of the most vibrant markets for the data center sector, with much of the attention dedicated to Northern VA, and primarily "Data Center Alley." While this specific hotbed for development and investment gets most of the attention, there are many notable submarkets in the greater Mid-Atlantic region that also boast immense availability to connectivity, low-cost power with opportunities to capitalize on renewable opportunity, as well as economic incentives from county to county providing a number of viable options. 

  1. How much do incentives play as one of the key ingredients in the site selection process? How are providers and submarkets collaborating to impact local communities and potential for data center growth? 

  2. What challenges and expansion opportunities for data centers are unique to the region and its submarkets, and how much has cloud computing and transformation affected growth?

  3. How do Mid-Atlantic submarkets compare to other fast-growing submarkets markets around the country?

  4. How are edge computing and high-density facilities creating new opportunities to expand into niche markets? Are providers seeing new value at the edge? 

  5. What are the key demand drivers for efficiency and how is it achieved? How is further investment in infrastructure outside of Data Center Alley increasing efficiency and performance? 

How You'll Do More Business: Outside of industrial, data centers are one of the hottest asset classes to invest in for many reasons including the need for connectivity and fast, accessible data. But Data Center Alley - one of the hottest areas to build data centers - only has so much land available, and the cost to develop their continues to increase as the market evolves. What markets, from Baltimore to Virginia Beach and beyond, are catching the eyes of data center developers and operators, and why? Plus, for those with land for sale, or looking to delve into the data center space, this virtual event will teach you where, and how, to make the best investments. 

Who You'll Meet: Top providers, owners, architects, contractors, developers, end-users, brokers, lawyers and other leaders within the greater Mid-Atlantic region.

What You Get: Access to all live content, panel replays on-demand, and live networking that is dynamic and actually useful. Networking tools include direct messaging, lobby chat and speed networking which have led to over 5,000 matches this year.

For questions, recommendations, comments, or press inquiries please email our Mid-Atlantic Senior Event Producer, Elizabeth Baker at liz.baker@bisnow.com

Agenda

Time Activity
1:00 PM
1:45 PM
Virtual Registration, Breakfast, and Networking
1:45 PM
3:00 PM
Data Center Mid-Atlantic Submarkets Surge

Analyzing Site Selection and Expansion Opportunity In Mid-Atlantic Submarkets, as well as Infrastructure and Operations Driving Efficiency For Facilities Coming Online

3:00 PM
3:30 PM
More Networking!

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