Goodman and CPP Investments Launch €8bn FLAP Data Center Platform

Goodman and CPP Investments Launch €8bn FLAP Data Center Platform

Key Takeaways

• Goodman Group and CPP Investments are creating a 50/50 European data center venture valued at €8bn.
• The initial €2.2bn commitment covers four powered sites across Frankfurt, Amsterdam, and Paris, totaling 435MW of primary power.
• All projects have secured power, permits, and early site work, enabling construction starts by June 30, 2026.

Goodman Group and CPP Investments are tightening a long-running global relationship with a new €8 billion platform focused squarely on Europe’s FLAP data center markets. For enterprise and cloud providers watching constrained power grids and patchy land availability across the region, the scale of the joint move is unusual. And that’s partly why it’s getting attention: platforms of this size, with power and permits already secured, don’t surface often.

The partnership, formally the Goodman European Data Centre Development Partnership, is split 50/50. Both organizations are putting up an initial €2.2 billion to bring four projects through development. Those sites span Frankfurt (FRA02), Amsterdam (AMS01), and two in Paris (PAR01 and PAR02). Together they will support 435MW of primary power and 282MW of IT load.

The focus on FLAP isn’t surprising. Despite regulatory pressure and grid limitations, Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, and Paris remain the four most demanded European hubs for hyperscale operators. It is worth noting that even Amsterdam, which saw a temporary moratorium on new builds a few years back, continues to draw hyperscale interest once power and zoning conditions are met. It serves as a reminder that operators still gravitate toward established connectivity ecosystems, no matter how many alternative edge proposals emerge.

CPP Investments’ Max Biagosch framed the partnership as both a strategic expansion and an extension of a long-term relationship with Goodman. His emphasis was on combining Goodman’s development pipeline and powered landbank with CPP’s experience in digital infrastructure. For a pension fund managing long-horizon returns, committing to a multi-market platform like this aligns cleanly with its stated strategy. CPP’s recent track record reinforces that point: the organization invested C$225 million in August to expand a data center in Cambridge, Ontario, and last year it committed KRW 1 trillion to a hyperscale joint venture in South Korea. Those moves, spread across North America and Asia, show a steady uptick in data center allocations since its first direct investment in 2017.

Goodman, for its part, has been methodically pushing deeper into digital infrastructure over the past several years. Known primarily as an industrial and commercial property firm, it has expanded data center projects across Australia, Hong Kong, the US, France, Germany, and Japan. The European partnership with CPP is a logical next step. Greg Goodman highlighted how rare it is to assemble powered sites of this scale in FLAP geographies—particularly sites that offer what operators increasingly value: predictable timelines and a path to delivery.

All four sites have secured power connections and planning permits. That is notable. In a number of European metros, available capacity has become the gating factor for new builds, not capital. Securing power ahead of time can shift timelines by years. The partners also report that early infrastructure work is already significantly advanced, enabling construction starts by June 30, 2026. For customers planning multi-region expansions, that lead time matters more than ever. There are plenty of developers with renderings and memorandums of understanding; far fewer can credibly guarantee shovels in the ground on a fixed schedule.

The transaction itself will unfold in phases, with completion expected by March 2026, subject to closing conditions. That staggered process may seem mundane, but it hints at the operational complexity beneath the surface. Multi-country data center portfolios require synchronized permitting, cross-border tax and regulatory alignment, and careful power procurement strategies. And yet the partners’ existing history—dating back to 2009 and including joint investments across Australia, Asia, Europe, and the Americas—suggests they are accustomed to navigating those layers.

For enterprise leaders and cloud strategists, the announcement raises a practical question: will this materially alleviate capacity constraints in FLAP markets, or simply add options for hyperscalers that were already queued up? The answer probably depends on timing. With construction starts targeted for mid-2026, the earliest phases of these sites will still arrive during a period when demand for AI infrastructure and high-density deployments continues to accelerate. If anything, demand curves are steepening faster than supply in many core markets. That is where the partnership’s emphasis on delivery certainty becomes relevant. Operators can tolerate a lot—uncertain zoning, extended permitting cycles, even rising construction costs—but unpredictable timelines are the real deal-breaker.

The partnership also underscores the ongoing shift in who is financing the next wave of hyperscale infrastructure. Pension funds and sovereign investors, not just private equity firms, are increasingly underwriting long-term digital infrastructure bets. It makes sense. Data centers, once lumped in with generic commercial real estate, now operate more like essential utilities. And utilities with 15–25 year demand horizons are exactly the kind of assets long-term capital likes to hold.

The FLAP concentration also reflects a straightforward calculus. These metros offer established fiber exchanges, proximity to large enterprise clusters, and, after years of buildout, experienced local contractor ecosystems. Even so, the partners are stepping into markets where grid operators face extraordinary pressure. Whether the pipeline maintains its current pace depends partly on national energy policies—an area where changes can be abrupt. France, for instance, has made grid modernization a top priority, while Germany continues to wrestle with balancing industrial demand against clean energy commitments. It isn't a barrier to development, but it is something operators now track as closely as they track latency maps.

Goodman and CPP’s ability to secure primary power across all four sites suggests they have been working on this portfolio longer than the announcement window implies. Developers don’t stumble into 435MW of allocated power across three countries. Or rather, if they do, it is rarely visible to the market until the pieces fall into place.

For customers, the takeaway is simple enough: new large-scale, well-powered capacity is coming to three of Europe’s most constrained metros. The timeline is still measured in years, not months, but that is the nature of the sector. The build may land just as the next wave of cloud expansion crests, driven by AI workloads that require far denser power per rack than legacy enterprise designs ever contemplated. The partnership doesn’t claim to solve that demand, but it gives hyperscalers and major platforms another anchor option at a moment when options are in short supply.