It has been a historic year for investment and consolidation in the data center industry.

Data center-related M&A has crossed the $30B mark in 2020, according to data compiled by Synergy Research Group. Deal volume far surpassed the previous annual record set in 2017. With two weeks left to go in the year, 2020 has seen 113 data center deals at a total value of $30.9B.

"There is no doubt that this has been a bumper year for data center M&A activity, despite COVID-19 inevitably slowing down some transaction and due diligence activities,” said John Dinsdale, chief analyst at Synergy Research Group.

“We are also aware of almost $7B in deals and IPOs that are at various stages of closing, so the pipeline remains robust despite the flurry of activity in 2020," he said. "This drive to find new sources of investment capital is being fueled by an almost inexhaustible demand for data center capacity.”

The $30.9B number was boosted by a handful of large deals, including the $8.4B acquisition of Interxion by Digital Realty, which closed earlier this year. Synergy counts five other data center deals valued at over $1B that closed this year.

Since 2015, the largest investors among data center firms have been Digital Realty and Equinix, the two largest colocation providers in the world.

Other "serial acquirers," according to Synergy, include Colony, CyrusOne, GDS, Digital Bridge/DataBank, Iron Mountain, NTT, GI Partners, Carter Validus, QTS and Keppel.

The coronavirus pandemic brought a flood of investor interest to data centers, with large colocation providers gaining market value as demand for cloud services soared. Overall, 2020 saw a number of strategic deals involving investment banks, with institutions like Goldman Sachs and Blackstone pouring capital into data center projects.