IXEurope gears up for IPO with second funding round

European Acquisition Capital (EAC) in September led a GBP40 million second-round funding for IXEurope, the one-year-old co-location and facilities management business it backed to the tune of GBP10 million on start-up last July.

Investors alongside EAC in the second round included Bank of America Equity Partners, JP Morgan Capital Corporation and First Union Capital Partners, as well as a number of LPs from the EAC fund. EAC remains the majority shareholder in IXEurope.

IXEurope, which provides co-location and facilities management services to Internet Service Providers (ISPs) telecoms operators and corporates, is a neutral’ provider. The company has no ties with any telecoms of Internet operators, which enables it to offer clients the widest possible choice of services and leased line connectivity. IXEurope’s datacentres offer diverse fibre routing from multiple carriers via a fully managed internal network; dual source power to the datacentre with five levels of fault tolerance; and a high level of site security.

The company will use the second-round capital to take its tally of co-location sites to eight by the end of this year and plans to open as many as 24 facilities across Europe within the next three years. It opened datacentres in London, Heathrow and Paris earlier this year and, immediately following the latest funding round, IXEurope announced the siting of its new IXDataCentre in Dusseldorf. As part of the second funding round, IXEurope also acquired IntelisSite BV, a company that operates centres in Frankfurt and Zurich, from JP Morgan Capital.

IXEurope was advised on the funding by JP Morgan and has also appointed the bank to review its future strategic options, including a possible flotation.

Commenting on the latest investment, EAC director Robert Mason says that investor demand exceeded supply, adding: “We are not surprised by this, given the growth of the Internet and telecom infrastructure market and the calibre of IXEurope’s management and its infrastructure systems. Alongside TeleCity, we expect IXEurope to become one of only a handful of

significant players in Europe”.