Digital Realty's Expansion Strategy for its New Milan Campus

Digital Realty is expanding its data centre footprint in southern Europe with plans to enter the Milan market, marking a further step in its Mediterranean growth strategy. 

The company has confirmed the acquisition of two parcels of land in Abbiategrasso, southwest of Milan, where it will develop a new data centre campus aimed at supporting rising demand for cloud, AI and interconnection services.

Located just one kilometre apart, the sites position Digital Realty at a key connectivity junction. The campus sits along a major subsea traffic corridor linking Milan with Genoa and Savona, while also providing access to established terrestrial fibre routes across the region. This combination places the development within a critical infrastructure network for both domestic and international data flows.

The move strengthens Digital Realty’s presence across Southern Europe, where it already connects hubs including Athens, Marseille and Sofia, with additional developments underway in Barcelona and Crete. The region is increasingly important as a digital bridge between Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia, particularly as demand for data centre capacity grows.

Building interconnection capacity in Milan

The Milan campus is designed to support a dense interconnection environment, enabling enterprises, cloud providers and content platforms to exchange data efficiently. Interconnection refers to the direct linking of networks within a data centre, allowing faster and more reliable data transfer compared with routing traffic through external networks.

Digital Realty plans to deliver an initial 8MW facility, focused on retail colocation and interconnection services. Colocation allows multiple customers to house their IT infrastructure within the same facility, sharing power, cooling and connectivity resources while maintaining operational control over their equipment.

The first phase is expected to be ready in 2028, with further expansion planned on the larger of the two sites. At full build-out, the campus could reach up to 84MW of capacity, supporting hyperscale deployments and enterprise workloads as demand increases.

"We’re excited to enter Milan, Italy’s business capital with a dynamic tech ecosystem," says Paula Cogan, Managing Director, EMEA, Digital Realty. "By expanding into Milan, we are providing much-needed infrastructure to support the city’s growth as a digital hub, fostering new content, interconnection and cloud communities while assuring long-term capacity for AI and hyperscale deployments."

Strengthening Italy’s data centre footprint

Digital Realty’s Milan expansion complements its ongoing development in Rome, where the company is constructing its first facility in the city. The Rome campus, known as ROM1, is expected to become operational in early 2027 and will form a key part of the company’s Italian footprint.

Together, the Milan and Rome sites position Digital Realty across Italy’s two primary connectivity hubs. This dual presence enables the company to support diverse workloads and provide resilience for customers operating across multiple regions.

The Milan campus is also located near existing hyperscale clusters, allowing for further expansion as demand for AI and cloud infrastructure continues to grow. Hyperscale refers to large-scale data centre environments designed to support massive computing workloads, often associated with global cloud providers and AI training operations.

By developing capacity in Milan, Digital Realty aims to support both local and international demand, while strengthening Italy’s role within the wider European digital infrastructure landscape. The campus is expected to contribute to the development of a more interconnected ecosystem, supporting enterprises and service providers that rely on low-latency connectivity and scalable infrastructure.

The company’s broader strategy reflects ongoing investment in key markets where digital demand is increasing, particularly in regions that act as crossroads for global data traffic.