James is a partner in the London office of Gibson Dunn and a member of the Real Estate Practice Group.
James has been a leading practitioner to the data centre industry since its inception and advises investors, developers, service providers, occupiers and other stakeholders globally in relation to this highly specialised asset class.
Representative experience*
- Multiple confidential mandates across the Nordics, EMEA, APAC and the Americas acting for sponsors, developers and operators with respect to scale datacenter developments, including Europe’s largest developments in France, Germany and the UK.
- Yondr Group, a global developer, owner and operator of hyperscale data centers, on its agreement to be acquired by DigitalBridge through one of its managed investment funds.
- Credit Suisse on the cross border sale and leaseback of critical data center facilities in both London and Singapore to Iron Mountain.
- Macquarie European Infrastructure Fund 7 on its purchase of a significant minority stake in Virtus Data Centres group from ST Telemedia (a portfolio company of Temasek). The Virtus Data Centres Group builds and operates data centres in England and is expanding into Europe.
- Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners, a private infrastructure investment platform within Morgan Stanley Investment Management (MSIM), on an exclusivity agreement to partner with Altice France to establish the first nationwide independent colocation provider in France through the acquisition of a 70 percent majority stake in UltraEdge, a newly established data center company.
- Credit Suisse on the cross border sale and leaseback of critical data center facilities in both London and Singapore to Iron Mountain.
- Citibank on the sale and leaseback of Frankfurt Data Center, the first sale and leaseback of its kind relating to its Western European data center campus.
- Digital Realty in relation the acquisition of eight high quality, carrier-neutral data centres across Europe in a deal worth in excess of US$874 million.
- Digital Realty in relation to the sale of its Paris operating business and data centre for approximately US$211 million to Equinix.
- IFC in relation to a confidential mandate relevant to the regulatory framework of an emerging data centre market.
- Citibank on the sale and leaseback of Frankfurt Data Center, the first sale and leaseback of its kind relating to its Western European data center campus.
*Some of these representations occurred prior to James’ association with Gibson Dunn.
Capabilities
- Real Estate
- Data Centers and Digital Infrastructure
- Land Use and Development
- Mergers and Acquisitions
- Private Equity
- Real Estate Disputes
- Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT)
Credentials
Education:
- Nottingham Trent University - 2004 Legal Practice Course
- University College, University of Oxford - 2003 Bachelor of Arts
Admissions:
- England & Wales - Solicitor