As our economy and daily lives shift increasingly online, highly specialized facilities called data centers have never been more vital. These are the hidden engines powering the internet, cloud services, AI, and all emerging digital innovations. With global data expected to grow 61% over 6 years, data centers must scale relentlessly.
But what exactly are data centers, and why do they matter? Simply put, they are secure, climate-controlled buildings containing thousands of high-capacity servers along with networking and storage infrastructure. The largest facilities can consume over 100 megawatts of power across multiple acres – enough electricity for 80,000 homes!
Data centers allow companies to centralize computing capacity and IT instead of managing hardware on-premise. Leading providers operate hundreds of cutting-edge centers worldwide, enabling the smooth flow of endless data.
This guide will overview the top 10 data center operators globally based on annual revenue. You‘ll learn about their technical capabilities, geographic reach, services offered, and more. Let‘s examine the biggest players in this crucial industry.
Why Data Centers Are Indispensable
Data centers empower game-changing technologies while running global communications and commerce. Companies rely on them for:
- Cloud services – Access to on-demand computing resources, storage, databases, analytics and more. This allows smaller firms to rapidly scale while enterprises save costs.
- Disaster recovery – Resilient data centers facilitate backups and system failover to minimize disruption.
- Specialized hardware – Providers house expensive gear like high-performance computing (HPC) clusters for research and machine learning.
- Connectivity – Data centers enable private direct connections between partner networks and public cloud services.
- Security and compliance – Leading firms offer state-of-the-art physical barriers, cybersecurity, and strict access controls.
Without these mission-critical facilities, the digital innovations we increasingly depend on would not be possible.
10 Largest Data Center Firms Worldwide
The elite data center operators handle enormous scale and soaring demand growth each year. Here they are ranked by total annual revenue:
| Rank | Company | 2021 Revenue |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | China Unicom | $303.8 billion |
| 2 | Amazon Web Services | $62 billion |
| 3 | China Telecom | $55.3 billion |
| 4 | NTT Communications | $7.4 billion |
| 5 | Equinix | $6.64 billion |
| 6 | Digital Realty | $4.7 billion |
| 7 | Cyxtera Technologies | $703.7 million |
| 8 | CoreSite | $638 million |
| 9 | Switch | $670 million |
| 10 | 365 Data Centers | $21 million |
Now let‘s analyze the key capabilities of the largest players in more detail.
China Unicom
China Unicom is the second largest telecom provider in China with over 300 million mobile subscribers and 140 million broadband customers. To enable its communications services, China Unicom operates a staggering 550+ data centers located across 130 cities nationally.
The company is aggressively expanding capacity, emphasizing new hyperscale sites to support surging cloud and 5G traffic. Last year its capital spending rose 9% to $17.5 billion, focused largely on data centers. Unicom also prides itself on sustainability efforts – its newest Beijing facility earned LEED Gold certification and utilizes cutting-edge Aegis II Monitoring to optimize PUE efficiency.
Amazon Web Services
Amazon Web Services dominates the global cloud infrastructure market, generating over 60% of Amazon‘s operating income. AWS runs an unparalleled portfolio of cloud data centers with 77 Availability Zones within 26 geographic regions. And the juggernaut continues building at breakneck speed: AWS will invest $38 billion in data center infrastructure in 2022 alone!
A core capability is enabling enterprises to scale computing requirements rapidly while only paying for what they use. Specialized solutions include high-performance computing capabilities for scientific research, media rendering in the cloud, and edge micro data centers deployed locally. No rival matches AWS‘s profound impact across industries – over 200,000 customers from Unilever to the CDC rely on its cloud infrastructure.
China Telecom
This state-owned telecom entity operates over 210 cloud data centers and 246 satellite access stations across China. That domestic network is further augmented by partnerships with data center providers in Europe, Asia-Pacific and North America.
Aside from IP transit and connectivity services, China Telecom excels at integrated cloud solutions. It offers IaaS, PaaS and SaaS capabilities that incorporate cutting-edge machine learning, IoT integration, industrial internet and edge computing technologies. These power smart city initiatives, telemedicine applications, autonomous transportation, and more.
NTT Communications
Headquartered in Japan, NTT Communications manages an ecosystem of over 140 secure data centers spanning 20+ countries globally. Crucially, over 40 of those facilities are company owned, while NTT partners with firms like Equinix for additional capacity. It has invested $2.9 billion over 5 years to unify management and service delivery across assets.
In addition to colocation and hybrid cloud offerings, a true differentiator for NTT lies in connectivity – its expansive Tier 1 IP network covers 300 countries and regions. The company serves over 8,000 global enterprise clients across manufacturing, finance, retail, logistics and more. It continues advancing innovations in SD-WAN, high-speed cloud interconnect, and optimized access to partners like Microsoft Azure.
Equinix
Unlike AWS and Aliyah‘s cloud services, Equinix operates a network focused exclusively on enabling interconnection. The company has invested over $23 billion to build its industry-leading platform of 230 data centers across 27 countries on 5 continents.
With network dense, carrier-neutral facilities in all major metro areas, Equinix acts as a conduit for direct data exchange between thousands of businesses and network/cloud providers. Its interconnected ecosystems reduce latency while increasing security and flexibility. For example, Equinix hosts key access points to public clouds like Azure, AWS and Oracle across every continent.
Industry Trends and Competitive Forces
Now that you understand the landscape of top data center operators worldwide, let‘s examine crucial industry trends:
- Consolidation – Mergers and acquisitions have accelerated as large players acquire smaller competitors. Lack of scale prevents smaller operators from keeping pace on capex spending.
- Cloud adoption continues fueling demand for bigger hyperscale data centers from AWS, Microsoft, Google. 80% of workloads could shift to the public cloud over 6 years.
- Hybrid IT mixing on-prem and colocation capacity along with public cloud will remain common for performance and risk mitigation.
- Emerging technologies like IoT, AI, AR/VR, autonomous vehicles are catalyzing edge data centers for localized processing.
- Sustainability efforts around energy, water and materials usage are rising but remain challenging given soaring data center workloads.
The leading firms all prioritize continuous global expansion while innovating on connectivity, cooling systems, automation and cybersecurity. Proximity to population centers also remains key for latency. Competitors are racing to stand up facilities to handle coming waves of data from 5G, smart cities, genomics research and more innovations we can barely conceive today.
The Future of the Data Center
Globally, data center capacity is expected to grow at a steady 6% CAGR over the next decade, reaching $174 billion annually by 2030 according to Digital Reality Research. Colocation services are forecast to rise even faster at nearly 9% CAGR. Top providers will continue expansion efforts, especially in Asia-Pacific countries.
China Unicom, China Telecom and other telecoms will drive rollout of 50G edge data centers across smart cities. AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud have enough capital to grow data centers at jaw-dropping rates.
To support technologies like autonomous driving, holographic telepresence, AI, IoT and more over coming decades, data centers must keep innovating rapidly. Our demand for computing shows no signs of abating, and these hidden engines will continue powering unprecedented progress long into the future through increasingly centralized mega facilities.
Of course challenges persist around energy usage, e-waste, and security risks. But with careful planning and advances in carbon-neutral centers running modern hardware, I remain optimistic these pioneers can scale responsibly to uplift business and humanity.
