# Equinix The world's largest data center REIT and colocation provider. Founded in 1998 by Al Avery and Jay Adelson — two facilities managers at Digital Equipment Corporation — and headquartered in Redwood City, California. Trades on Nasdaq as EQIX. Converted to a real estate investment trust in January 2015. As of mid-2026, Equinix operates approximately 260 data centers across 72+ metros in 33 countries on five continents, employing more than 13,000 people. Full-year 2025 revenue was $9.22B; the company guides for $10.1–10.2B in 2026 on the strength of AI-driven demand, which accounted for 60% of its largest deals in Q1 2026. ## xScale Joint Ventures Equinix's hyperscale strategy centers on its xScale program — purpose-built campuses that let cloud and AI hyperscalers add core deployments alongside their existing interconnection footprints at Equinix IBX (International Business Exchange) facilities. The xScale program launched in 2019 as a joint venture with GIC (Singapore's sovereign wealth fund) for European campuses. It has since expanded to Asia and the Americas. In late 2024, Equinix announced a new U.S.-focused JV with GIC and CPP Investments (Canada Pension Plan) intended to raise over $15B in capital. GIC and CPP Investments each hold 37.5% equity; Equinix retains 25%. At full buildout, this JV nearly triples the total investment capital of the xScale portfolio. ## AI-Era Expansion Equinix is funding 46 active builds across 32 markets as of Q2 2026, with capital expenditures expected to reach $4.1B for the year. Eight of the top 10 AI model providers are expanding inside Equinix facilities, and Q2 2026 set a record with 9,700 net new interconnections — a key metric reflecting rising demand for connected [[Artificial Intelligence]] infrastructure. ## KB Relevance Equinix is the physical backbone of the internet's interconnection layer and a critical piece of the infrastructure stack for every major cloud and AI company. Its xScale expansion directly feeds [[The Quest for 90 Gigawatts]] — the massive power buildout required to support the AI training and inference wave. As both a landlord and interconnection hub, Equinix occupies a chokepoint position that makes it a proxy for tracking overall AI infrastructure investment. ## See Also - [[The Quest for 90 Gigawatts]] - [[Artificial Intelligence]] - [[Brookfield Asset Management]] - [[NVIDIA]] - [[Blackstone]]