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Global Switch, the leading owner and operator of large scale, multi tenanted carrier neutral data centres in Europe and Asia Pacific, today announced that Moody's has upgraded its long-term issuer rating to Baa2 from Baa3. The rating outlook remains stable.
Following today's upgrade and the recent upgrade by Fitch Ratings of Global Switch's rating to BBB+ from BBB, Global Switch becomes the highest credit rated data centre company in the world. Only one other major provider has achieved an investment grade rating.
The further upgrade to Global Switch's already strong investment grade rating is testament to the Company's consistent track record of delivery and its high quality portfolio of multi-tenant, carrier-neutral data centres in seven global financial and business centres. In upgrading Global Switch to Baa2 from Baa3, Moody's recognises the Company's commitment to its highly focused investment strategy as well as its conservative approach to leverage and development. Moody's also observes Global Switch's consistent track record and continued expectation of strong demand for its services, supported by assets in irreplaceable locations, with high occupancy and long term leases.
Moody's upgrade follows soon after the announcement that the assessment of Global Switch's liquidity has been revised to "strong" from "adequate" by Standard and Poor's. The credit rating was affirmed by Standard and Poor's at BBB with a stable outlook. The short-term credit rating was also affirmed at A-2.
John Corcoran, Executive Chairman and CEO, Global Switch, said: "Following a series of credit ratings upgrades, Global Switch now has the highest credit rating for a data centre company in the world. The ratings upgrades recognise the continued resilience of Global Switch and its growing and predictable earnings profile. It is testament to the strength of our balance sheet and diversified portfolio of assets and further enhances our competitive advantage. This will enable us to access the deepest and most consistently available pools of liquidity to increase our financial flexibility and to reduce our cost of capital further."
All three of the major rating agencies have now completed their annual review of Global Switch's business, including thoroughly assessing its financial, commercial, leadership and operational characteristics, with the upgrades resulting in the strongest investment grade credit ratings in the sector globally.
All data centre customers pay close attention to the credit rating of their data centre provider because it offers guidance on the business and financial strength of the company, the average duration of its debt and its ability to expand its facilities with either its own resources or by raising new finance.
Additional information regarding Global Switch's ratings can be found in press releases accessible from the rating agency websites at: www.fitchratings.com, www.moodys.com and www.standardandpoors.com.
For further information about Global Switch, please visit www.globalswitch.com.
Global Switch
Ali Ballantine
+44 (0)20 8054 9053
Finsbury
Jenny Davey / Anjali Unnikrishnan
+44 (0)20 7251 3801
For press enquiries please email
press@globalswitch.com
Notes to editors:
About Global Switch
Founded in 1998, Global Switch Holdings Ltd (Global Switch) owns and operates large scale Tier III* data centres that are carrier neutral and multi-tenanted. The Company's focus is on highly resilient, central, low latency, network dense locations in prime, city centre locations and internet hubs close to its customers on the edge of financial and business districts.
Global Switch operates 300,000 square metres (3,200,000 square feet) across ten data centres in seven cities in Europe and Asia Pacific.
The data centre industry is benefitting from attractive market dynamics, characterised by growth in internet usage, combined with the expansion of cloud computing, outsourcing and regulation which have led to significant growth in demand from financial institutions, corporations and governments.
Global Switch is part way through a significant global expansion plan which started with an extension of its Singapore data centre in 2010 and the building of a second data centre on its Paris campus in 2012. Having secured pre-commitments from a number of large multi-national companies, Global Switch launched the first stage of a planned expansion of its Amsterdam data centre and the first stage of Sydney East, its second data centre in Sydney, earlier this year.
The next investments in the expansion programme are planned to be new data centres in Hong Kong and Singapore, where Global Switch is planning a second facility, together with further stages of the newly opened Sydney East data centre. Thereafter, the Company also has medium term plans to expand its existing sites in Europe. Global Switch maintains a low risk strategy of increasing capacity at existing locations in line with market demand.
At financial year-end 31 March 2014, Global Switch reported total revenues of £358.4 million and total assets of £4.4 billion. Since 2007 the company has been wholly owned by Aldersgate Investments Limited, a Reuben Brothers company (see www.reubenbrothers.com), which first acquired an interest in the company in 2004.
Disclaimer The statements contained herein may include statements of future expectations and other forward-looking statements that are based on management's current views and assumptions and involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results, performance or events to differ materially from those expressed or implied in such statements. In addition to statements which are forward-looking by reason of context, these forward-looking statements can be identified by terminology such as "will," "expects," "anticipates," "future," "intends," "plans," "believes," "estimates" and similar statements. This announcement is for information purposes only and does not constitute an offer to sell or an invitation to subscribe for or a solicitation of an offer to buy or subscribe for any securities.
Note * A Tier III data centre is an industry standard classification for a data centre composed of redundant power and cooling distribution paths, providing a minimum of 99.982% availability.
