Admittedly it's just my opinion and I am open to it being challenged, obviously management thought it was the way to go.
I get all the technical and efficiency reasons, the Data Centre was always going to be built into separate data halls regardless and plant was always going to be added in a modular fashion.
My issue is around lead times. If there was no lead time then obviously there's no issue. There is obviously a lead time to order new plant, install, commission and test it.
That time has been put at ~9-12 Months. Historically 2MVA is only ~ 12 months contracted sales at S1/M1. Is 12 months forward capacity enough when you have a 9-12 month lead time to add more supply?
Obviously it makes financial sense to closely match investment in new plant as close as possible to when its actually needed, but you don't want to cut this line so fine at the risk that you may lose face and cost yourself reputational damage or otherwise.
I have seen where this costs you in the past due to logistical issues, e.g. problem with a supplier (could be fire, weather/natural disasters, industrial strikes, unexpected demand) Unbelievably even with all the testing that is supposed to happen before a product leaves the factory you still end up with DOA's or failure's shortly after commissioning, not a problem when the manufacturer/distributor is responsive and close by with ample spares.
I'd also expect when the new DataCentre opens up, there may be some pent up demand. Bigger clients will want to locate there as it offers more room to grow, some customers are going to want to move their DR setup into it. Others may wish to use it as a DR location due to its geographical proximity to their existing servers and then you have all the other new customers.
Looking at Equinix it seems like a lot of their major partners, rush to open in each new facility.
I think on a $150M 25MW facility you can afford to commission > 2MW or ~12months supply (could be less). Consider it a cheap insurance policy at worst.
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