Jennifer Weitzel joined GLP a year ago to lead the data centre team
GLP announced this past week that it has launched a new business, based on its growing data centre assets and operations, to provide digital infrastructure for hyperscale companies and large enterprises.
Branded as Ada Infrastructure, the new company is being rolled out with 850MW of IT capacity already secured across Japan, the UK and Brazil, with an additional pipeline set to yield another 1.5 gigawatts in the future.
Named for a British mathematician often credited with writing the world’s first computer programme, Ada is led by former Microsoft executive Jennifer Weitzel, who joined GLP as head of its global data centre business, excluding mainland China, in July of last year.
“Like our namesake, Ada Lovelace, considered the world’s first computer programmer, we believe in technology’s potential to benefit society, an idea she described as ‘poetical science’,” Weitzel said. “In this spirit, we are committed to meeting the ever-growing capacity needs of the world’s most transformative companies, while making a positive impact on communities and the planet.
US Industry Veterans
Before joining GLP in 2022, Weitzel had spent six years at Microsoft in Redmond, Washington, including serving most recently as a vice president with the company’s cloud infrastructure leasing and M&A team.
Her stint at Microsoft came after Weitzel had spent more than seven years at data centre REIT Digital Realty in San Francisco, including working there as a senior vice president of commercial and global supply chain. The graduate of Queen’s University in Ontario also has previous experience with Tesco in the UK.
Having worked over the past year to assemble an experience data centre management team, Ada is said to have developed a “future-ready global design playbook, ” which leverages features that can accommodate evolving technologies that enhance efficiency and performance. Ada aims to support the rapid growth of cloud services and artificial intelligence safely, securely, and sustainably, the company said in its statement.
Weitzel’s LinkedIn profile shows her continuing to reside in Seattle, with Ada having a squad of senior vice presidents spread across Santa Monica, Menlo Park, San Francisco, Boston, New York and other US hubs.
Leveraging Development Capabilities
With crescendoing requirements from AI implementations fuelling new bookings of data centres in the past several months, the US from April through June had its biggest quarter ever for leasing of rackspace. Total leasing in the country during the second quarter reached 2.1GW, while the total existing capacity in the US stood at just 10GW at the end of June, according to research by TD Cowen.
GLP’s Suzhou Changshu facility is among its growing set of bit barns in the region
“Data centers play a critical role in making the modern world run more efficiently and are where some of the world’s biggest challenges are being solved,” said Ming Mei, co-founder and CEO of GLP. “Scientific discoveries, medical advancements, communication systems, new and more accessible financial services, global commerce, and now the AI revolution are all made possible within data centers.”
With GLP owning and operating assets and businesses in 17 countries across Asia, Europe and the Americas, the company sees this global presence as supporting Ada Infrastructure’s ability to quickly identify and secure sites in key high demand markets.
GLP has been increasing its presence in the data centre market over the past several years including setting up a $12 billion Japan digital infrastructure platform in 2022. Last month the company broke ground on a 31MW facility in western Tokyo as its first data centre in the country.
The company also established a separate data centre business in mainland China during 2018, where it has secured IT capacity of over 1,400MW.
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