Telecity’s Finnish purchase met with hostile reception from City
TELECITY, the British data centre operator, yesterday announced it had bought Finnish company Academica for €28m (£22.4m) in a bid to expand its operations in the Nordic market.
Data centres in Finland are a valuable commodity, since much of the growing internet traffic from Russia uses it.
However, the acquisition disappointed the City, with analysts saying Telecity had overpaid. “At €28m for 1MW of operational capacity, today’s (admittedly small) deal seems very expensive,” Investec’s James Goodman said. Telecity’s shares fell 7.5 per cent yesterday.
Numis downgraded the stock from “add” to “hold” as Telecity also put out a trading update that the bank called “cautious”.
The company said trading “has remained robust” and said the year’s performance would be in line with expectations.
Telecity management put their faith in the company yesterday, however. Chief executive Michael Tobin bought £16,872 in shares after the price fell.