Damac’s $20b US investment: Here’s everything you need to know

Dubai: Dubai real estate firm Damac plans to build data centres with a capacity of 2000MW over the next four years in the US, the company revealed following President-elect Trump’s overnight announcement.

Edgnex, a Dubai-headquartered digital infrastructure company owned by Damac, announced an initial investment of $20 billion with “potential plans of doubling the investment on the basis of future demand, market opportunity, and scalability.”

Edgnex said it plans to leverage Damac’s equity, bank debt, and potential third-party capital to fuel its expansion in the U.S.

The announcement came following a press conference hosted by President-elect Donald Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, where he introduced Damac Founder Hussain Sajwani. A decade ago, Damac partnered with the Trump family to build the first Trump-branded golf course in the Middle East.

In a statement shared with Gulf News, Damac confirmed that the Edgnex expansion plan will focus on sunbelt states, specifically Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, and Louisiana, and midwest states, such as Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, and Indiana.

It explained, “The first phase includes capacity build-up through joint ventures with partners, acquiring land banks in conjunction with utilities, and acquiring existing data centres and platforms.”

“It will represent approximately 500MW capacity—one in the Sunbelt and one in the Midwest. This will meet the growing current demand as EDGNEX continues to scale,” the company explained.

Edgnex’s existing portfolio includes operations in 10 countries - UAE, KSA, Turkey, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Greece, Spain, Finland and Italy - with a projected capacity exceeding 1000MW+. Current operational data centres include over 10MW in Saudi Arabia and 5MW in Thailand, which will be operational by Q1 2025. By 2026, EDGNEX aims to have over 300MW+ operational globally.

The company also clarified that Edgnex is an infrastructure provider and does not handle or manage data privacy or compliance.