Spain's Nabiax to expand Madrid data center campus with €800M investment

Spanish data center operator Nabiax is moving forward with a major expansion of its campus in Alcalá de Henares, just outside Madrid, as part of a broader strategy to scale its European footprint. The company said it is preparing a new business plan centered on the ADC3 project, which will add a third building to the existing campus and lift total IT capacity to more than 100MW.

The expansion is part of a wider ambition to grow the company's overall capacity from the current 35MW to 140MW in the coming years, backed by a planned investment of approximately €800 million ($925.8 million). The project underscores the accelerating demand for data center capacity in Southern Europe, driven by the growth of cloud services and artificial intelligence workloads.

Nabiax CEO Pablo Ruiz-Escribano said the company is evaluating new investment opportunities in Madrid while also exploring international expansion into Portugal, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Germany. "We are entering a new phase defined by a clear goal of significant growth," he said, noting that Nabiax, founded seven years ago as a spin-off from Telefónica, is now positioning itself as a key player in the European data center market.

The existing campus in Alcalá de Henares comprises two facilities: ADC1, launched in 2013 with 4,800 square meters of space, and ADC2, launched in 2022 with 6,000 square meters. Together, they currently deliver 22MW of IT capacity. The ADC3 project is expected to more than quadruple the campus's total capacity, reflecting the company's confidence in sustained demand in the Madrid region.

Nabiax's growth trajectory has been shaped by a series of ownership changes. Asterion Industrial Partners created the company in 2019 after acquiring 11 data centers in Spain and Latin America from Telefónica. Telefónica later contributed three additional assets in exchange for a 20 percent stake in 2021. Nabiax sold its Latin American portfolio to Actis in 2023, and in 2024, Aermont, a European asset management firm linked to Keppel, acquired the company.

Beyond the Alcalá de Henares campus, Nabiax operates the 10MW Julián Camarillo data center near Madrid and the 1.3MW Terrassa facility outside Barcelona. The company's expansion plans come at a time when European data center operators are racing to meet rising demand for digital infrastructure, driven by hyperscale cloud providers and enterprise adoption of AI-enabled services. Industry analysts note that the Iberian Peninsula is becoming an increasingly attractive location for such investments, thanks to its renewable energy resources, favorable climate for cooling, and growing connectivity to global markets.

The €800 million investment plan signals Nabiax's intent to compete more aggressively in the European market, where capacity constraints and long lead times for new developments have become a critical concern for enterprises and cloud providers alike. As the company moves forward with ADC3 and evaluates new markets, its ability to execute on these projects will be closely watched by industry observers.