Equinix CEO on pledge to cut emissions by 50% by 2030

Yahoo Finance’s Akiko Fujita and Zack Guzman speak with Equinix CEO Charles Meyers about the company’s deal with Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC.

Video transcript

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AKIKO FUJITA: Well, the world's largest data center company announcing a near $4 billion deal with Singapore's sovereign wealth fund. Equinox saying that will increase global connectivity for those hyperscalers like AWS as well as Microsoft's Azure.

Let's bring in Charles Meyers, Equinox's CEO. Charles, it's good to talk to you today. Walk me through how this deal came about and what you see as the biggest upside.

CHARLES MEYERS: Akiko, thanks for having me today. Happy Friday. Yeah, we've been working on this for a while. We actually announced-- I guess it's been a couple of years ago now-- our initial joint venture with GIC, the sovereign wealth fund of Singapore, aimed at putting capital behind really meeting the demand that is being fueled by the digital revolution that we're all seeing and the demand for these hyperscale customers that you just referenced, Google, Microsoft, others.

And so this is an extension of that deal to now put up almost $7 billion of capital to work to respond to that demand. And we're really excited about the road ahead.

AKIKO FUJITA: When you talk about the growth of data centers, we already saw a significant upside. But it has just exploded over the pandemic, largely because of this digital transition we've seen so many different businesses push to. Walk me through the scale of that growth and how you see that continuing, even as things start to return to normal.

CHARLES MEYERS: It's enormous. I think it's hard to even really fathom. We live in an increasingly digital world. Your last guest was referencing that. And we're experiencing it as consumers. But it's absolutely driving capital spending on the enterprise side as well.

And I think we're going to continue to see that. The World Economic Forum estimates that we're going to see in aggregate economic impact in the $100 trillion-plus range by 2025 from digital. And I think that's just going to continue to fuel demand for digital infrastructure.

AKIKO FUJITA: What kind of growth are you seeing outside of the US? I mean,when you look at a place like Asia, for example, you can certainly argue that things have been much more accelerated than those of us here in the US because they've already made that giant leap, really, to mobile, online. Where are you seeing the biggest growth?

CHARLES MEYERS: Yeah, actually Asia-Pac is our fastest growing region in the world, partially a state of maturity, also driven though by technology factors like very, very deep penetration of mobile. They are probably a little later in terms of cloud adoption. But I think that's accelerating there significantly. And we're seeing cloud providers build out their infrastructure across Asia. And we're a central part of that.

Also a strong performance in Europe. And then our Americas business is actually re-accelerating as well. So we're seeing strong growth across the board.

ZACK GUZMAN: Charles, obviously, sustainability is a big question among any industry. And you guys continue to expand here. I know you've made commitments on that front to go carbon neutral by, what 2030? I mean, talk to me about progress being made there.

CHARLES MEYERS: Yeah. We're super-excited about that. And obviously, we're playing a key role in delivering that $100 trillion of value that's out there. But we believe, as the market leader in our industry, that we've got a real responsibility to ensure that that value is delivered in a responsible and sustainable manner. And that's why we've made a number of sustainability commitments. And that's a key priority for us.

Last year, we invested about $14 million to create an energy efficiency center of excellence. And this week, as you referenced, we're adding to our commitment to 100% renewable energy and going beyond that, setting a set of science-based targets that allow us to achieve climate-neutral status by 2030. And so we're excited about that.

There's a variety of levers in doing that. And we think that generating and demonstrating that thought leadership is an important thing for us.

AKIKO FUJITA: I've been inside some of the data centers. It's incredible to see the amount of energy that's required to keep temperatures cooler. You've got this goal. But to what extent has the technology caught up? I mean, we've heard the arguments that, ultimately, it can't just be about trying to find the most efficient way. There's got to be more technological advancements that will help as we see the data centers continue to scale.

CHARLES MEYERS: Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, I think part of it is consolidation of technology into a smaller number of locations, which is occurring as the digital ecosystem sort of consolidates. That is actually a helpful phenomenon because technology can be applied in a more concentrated fashion. But I do think it's going to require a number of things that allow us to continue to use different sources of energy, use them better and more efficiently.

And we have those included as levers in our plan to achieve climate-neutral status, backed by a green financing plan that is also-- we recently went to market with a green bond. Had incredible response to that. And so all those things, I think, tie together to allow us to pursue this sustainability agenda.

ZACK GUZMAN: All right, the CEO of Equinix there, Charles Meyers, appreciate you taking the time to chat with us today.