ING, UniCredit finance Retelit data centres
Author: Joe Peck
ING, a Dutch multinational banking and financial services corporation, and UniCredit, an Italian multinational banking group operating across Europe, have structured a €375 million (£324.7 million) project financing agreement for Retelit Datacentre, the data centre arm of the Italian telecommunications and ICT operator, supporting the expansion of its data centre footprint in Italy.
The funding will be used to develop three new data centres in Milan and Rome, increasing Retelit’s total capacity from 18 MW to 45 MW. The expansion is intended to strengthen Italy’s position as a connectivity hub in Southern Europe.
Retelit Datacentre operates an interconnection platform across 38 sites, including the Avalon Campus in Milan, serving telecoms providers, enterprises, public sector organisations, and global technology companies.
ING and UniCredit acted as structuring banks, debt advisors, global coordinators, and bookrunners for the transaction, with ING Italia also serving as facility agent.
Expansion targets growing interconnection demand
The additional capacity reflects increasing demand for data centre interconnection across distributed infrastructure, particularly as organisations expand digital services and cloud deployments.
Andrea Diamanti, CEO and Head of Wholesale Banking at ING Italy, says, “This deal reflects the strength of [ING’s] Wholesale Banking division in Italy and the value of our global network, with ING’s Italian and Dutch teams collaborating closely to bring it to completion.”
Sicco Boomsma, Global Head Digital Infrastructure Advisory at ING Bank, adds, “This is a very relevant transaction for the Italian DC market, allowing enterprises, carriers, and cloud service providers to optimise their DC communications function across a network of distributed DC infrastructure in Italy.
“It was an absolute honour to support the company in this transaction during a phase of transition in the group, where they carved out the DC platform from the carrier-based business.”
Retelit states that its data centres are powered entirely by renewable energy and operate with power usage effectiveness (PUE) levels below typical market benchmarks.
ING reports it has now completed more than 200 data centre financing transactions globally, including projects involving Equinix, Atlas Edge, and Ark Data Centres.
