Superannuation giant Aware Super is set to invest US$300 million to acquire a minority stake in the Asia-Pacific arm of US-based Vantage Data Centers, signaling a push into the booming artificial intelligence infrastructure sector.
Vantage APAC operates ten data centres across Australia, Japan, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Hong Kong, hosting hyperscale cloud providers such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, and Google, as well as emerging AI firms.
The funds will support the development of up to 1 gigawatt of additional capacity on already-acquired sites.
This marks Aware’s second major data centre investment following a US$500 million stake in US-based Switch Datacenters in 2023.
The transaction is structured through Skyline JV alongside New York Stock Exchange-listed DigitalBridge and adds to US$1.6 billion Vantage APAC raised last year from global investors including Singapore's GIC and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority.
Aware Super’s $21 billion infrastructure fund, which has built a $6 billion digital infrastructure portfolio over five years, already holds stakes in telecommunications firms such as Australia's Vocus, New Zealand's 2Degrees, and European bandwidth provider euNetworks.
Infrastructure portfolio manager Jiren Zhou said data centres meet key investment criteria—essential service, high barriers to entry, and stable income—and expects cloud and generative AI demand to drive double-digit growth.
Head of infrastructure Mark Hector noted Asia-Pacific’s underdeveloped data centre capacity presents significant opportunity, with the region forecast to need up to 20 gigawatts by 2030.