Capacity at 55H, a high-density colocation data centre just north of Toronto, is scheduled to increase this summer and again in 2026 to meet the growing computational needs and power demands of artificial intelligence (AI) clients.

The Tier III data centre -- located on a 9.77-acre site at 55 Hereford St. in the City of Brampton -- currently has 2.5 megawatts (MW) of available information technology power to lease. That will double this summer and an additional 15 MW will be added in the first half of 2026.

That will allow 55H to provide total capacity of up to 20 MW to support large-scale AI operations as a result of expanding the utility feed from 10 MW today to 27 MW by the end of this year.

Grain Management, LLC, a private investment firm and solutions provider to the global broadband industry, acquired 55H in partnership with StratCap, a global alternative asset management platform focused on digital infrastructure, from Choice Properties in June 2023.

Ted Manvitz, managing director and head of international investments for Grain Management, told RENX in an email interview Choice was using only a small portion of the data centre’s capacity. Thus, the facility was more valuable to a company such as Grain which looks for high-quality infrastructure assets in attractive, fast-growing markets where it can invest in development to unlock growth.

“The asset was attractive firstly due to being in Toronto, which is one of the fastest-growing data centre markets in North America,” Manvitz wrote. “Being a supply-constrained market and home to some of the largest cloud tenants, Toronto continues to be a growing market with key market tailwinds attributed to the rapid pace of digital transformation and the growth of artificial intelligence and big data. 

“We’ve been seeing attractive market dynamics of supply trailing the robust demand in Toronto, resulting in low vacancy rates and rising lease rates over the past few years.”

What 55H offers

The 55H expansion is being executed in partnership with Core Data Centres Inc., which specializes in the management and operation of advanced data centre facilities.

“Existing clients are investment-grade tenants and are small relative to the expansion space available,” Manvitz explained.

The current 13-year-old 55H facility comprises over 126,000 square feet, but there’s approximately 90,000 square feet of owned land adjacent to it that can be used for additional expansion.

By offering up to 130 kilowatts per rack as well as infrastructure consisting of contiguous space, large floor plates and water-cooling technology, 55H is designed to offer clients the capability to efficiently manage such intensive AI processes as machine learning and deep learning tasks.

The 55H data centre also features a range of security measures:

• a 2.4-metre high fenced perimeter;
• dedicated 24/7/365 security staff;
• turnstiles with anti-tailgate protection;
• biometric authentication in addition to a card access system;
• dozens of strategically positioned closed-circuit television and pan, tilt and zoom security cameras;
• and bullet-resistant glass and a reinforced wall in the security office. 

Future growth for Grain Management

The Brampton data centre is the only one outside of the United States which is owned by Grain — a company headquartered in Washington, D.C. which also has offices in New York, Florida and London, England. Manvitz, however, is open to further Canadian and global expansion.

“Canada is an attractive market with strong demand trends across AI, cloud and enterprise, as we are seeing in Toronto, and we are always looking for more investment opportunities in global markets,” he observed.

“Grain has been focused on digital infrastructure since our founding 19 years ago. We look for opportunities to expand digital innovation to underserved areas globally.”