Chicago

Colocation Insights

• Demand continued to be driven by hyperscale and enterprise activity, resulting in higher asking rental rates.
• Demand for colocation space from AI-related tenants increased in H2.
• The availability rate for blocks of 5MW or more was only 1%.

Market Trends

• Power delivery timelines and costs continued to rise with ComEd currently inundated with new requests.
• Emerging submarkets in Greater Chicago have seen notable activity by data center developers and hyperscalers primarily seeking more than 500MW of capacity.
• Developers are prioritizing power availability over location for new development sites.

Notable Activity

• Microsoft acquired 350 acres in Cherry Valley outside of Rockford, IL.
• CyrusOne acquired an additional 32 acres in Aurora across I-88 from its existing campus.
• Prologis, in partnership with Skybox, sold its 32-MW Elk Grove Village facility to HMC Capital.
• T5 began construction on its Northlake data center.
• Oppidan began construction on its Carol Stream data center.
• Chicago greenlighted QTS’s plan to add a 465,000-sq.-ft. building to its existing 2800 S Ashland campus.
• Compass began development of its Hoffman Estates campus.
• PsiQuantum plans a 300,000-sq.-ft. quantum computing facility on the former U.S. Steel site along Chicago’s south shore.

Figure 1: Historical Market Information

Figure 2: Historical Supply and Demand

Figure 3: % of Total Primary Market Inventory

Figure 4: Market Fuel Mix

Figure 5: Average Asking Rates