Rendering of Metro Edge's Illinois Medical District (IMD) Data Center
"We are thrilled to have best-in-class partners like Corgan, Clune, Power, and Ujamaa working with us to design and construct this facility. It is a testament to their belief in this project and the positive impact it will have on the West Side of Chicago.”
CHICAGO (PRWEB) November 30, 2022
Metro Edge Development Partners, a commercial real estate development firm and minority business enterprise (MBE), announced it has finalized agreements with Corgan, Clune Construction, Power Construction, and Ujamaa Construction to design and build its state-of-the-art data center in the Illinois Medical District (IMD). They join T5 Data Centers as the team that will design, construct, and operate the new data center.
“Metro Edge was founded as a firm focused on high-impact, technology-driven developments that have a positive impact on the market and the local community,” said Bradley Beile, COO of Metro Edge. “We are thrilled to have best-in-class partners like Corgan, Clune, Power, and Ujamaa working with us to design and construct this facility. It is a testament to, not only their belief in this project, but also the importance of the development and the positive impact it will have on the West Side.”
The $257 million state-of-the-art data center is expected to break ground in 2023 and open in 2024. Metro Edge recently announced the company secured a 75-year ground lease on a 1.97-acre parcel in the IMD to build and operate a 19.8 megawatt, five-story, 184,720 square foot, high-performance data center that will address the technology infrastructure needs of local and regional healthcare, financial, educational, and government organizations. The facility has already secured 50% preleasing.
Located on the West Side of Chicago, the construction of the data center will support over 200 construction jobs and, once completed, over 70 full-time jobs including data center engineers, electricians, tech support personnel, and operations.
The new data center will be designed by Corgan, a renowned local architecture firm with decades of experience designing data centers, healthcare and education facilities, commercial buildings, and airport terminals.
“Corgan has a rich history of supporting our clients across the data center sector, including the largest wholesale and hyperscale client in the world,” said Dan Drennan, Principal at Corgan. “We believe the IMD project has the potential to transform the data center landscape in Chicago and we are excited to work with Metro Edge to bring this data center online.”
Corgan is leading all the architecture, engineering, and design elements of the project while Clune will oversee all construction aspects of the development in partnership with Power and Ujamaa and T5 as project manager.
“This project represents a major investment in the West Side of Chicago and meaningfully improves the neighborhood by building on land that has sat vacant for decades,” said 28th Ward Alderman Jason Ervin. “The development is being led by a top minority-owned real estate company and will generate jobs, revenue, and important social impact programs for the community.”
“We believe this diverse collection of industry professionals will allow Metro Edge to deliver one of the highest-performance data centers in Chicago,” added Mr. Beile. “We are excited to get to work.”
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About Metro Edge Development Partners
Metro Edge Development Partners is a Chicago-based commercial real estate development firm and minority business enterprise (MBE). Our mission is to pursue institutional-quality investment opportunities that deliver exceptional results to our financial and community partners. Led by a team with decades of private equity real estate experience, Metro Edge targets data centers, life sciences, and technology-oriented developments in primary urban locations around the country. Simply put, we create significant value in areas overlooked by our competitors. To learn more, please visit https://medp.io
About Clune Construction
Clune Construction is a national, employee-owned general contractor, with more than 600 talented professionals located in six offices across the U.S. Since 1997, Clune has provided construction management services for some of the most respected companies in the world. The company manages over $1 billion in construction projects annually.
About Corgan
Corgan is a leading architecture and design firm with a decades-long reputation for great customer service. Corgan has expertise across six market sectors – aviation, commercial, data centers, education, healthcare, and interiors.
About Power Construction
Power Construction is a management-owned commercial construction company founded in 1926, that focuses on the greater Chicago metro area. With annual revenue of $1 billion and a professional staff of 270, Power is ranked #1 in Chicago on Crain's Chicago Business List of Largest General Contractors. The Chicago Tribune has recognized Power Construction as a Top Workplace for the past five years running. Client types include healthcare, hospitality, developer, workplace, education, industrial, aviation, and luxury residential.
About T5 Data Centers (T5)
T5 Data Centers (T5) is a full lifecycle data center partner. The company provides customized build-to-suit, wholesale turnkey or powered shell data centers, critical facility construction, and ongoing facility management and operations services. T5 offers expert critical facility construction and its Uptime Award Winning facility management and operations services across its portfolio of data centers. T5 currently operates over 500 MW of critical load across 55 data centers and offers turnkey or build to suit data center solutions in 9 U.S. markets.
About Ujamaa Construction
Ujamaa Construction (“UJAMAA”) was founded in 2002 by Jimmy Akintonde to create a working organization that pays an equal amount of attention to quality of completed projects, safety of its employees, social responsibility, sustainability, corporate profitability, and citizenship within the company’s communities. UJAMAA has experienced explosive growth, opening an office in Atlanta, Georgia in 2017.