The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board is investing $225 million in the construction of a 54-megawatt hyperscale data-centre expansion project in Cambridge, Ont.

CPPIB will provide the funding through a 50% interest in a construction loan, with Deutsche Bank Private Credit & Infrastructure funding the remaining half as lead lender on the transaction.

The project is being developed through a joint-venture involving Related Digital, TowerBrook Capital Partners, and Ascent. Related and Towerbrook are based in New York, while Ascent is headquartered in London.

The Cambridge expansion project has already been preleased on a long-term basis to an unidentified AI cloud-compute provider.

“The rapid expansion of digital infrastructure—driven by accelerating demand for cloud services, data storage, and the transformative potential of artificial intelligence—is fuelling strong growth in data-centre development,” said Geoffrey Souter, CPPIB’s head of real assets credit. “[CPPIB] has deep expertise in this sector and an investment in the construction financing of this project marks another milestone in advancing our global data-centre strategy and strengthens our presence in the Canadian market.”

CPPIB maintains data-centre investments and joint-ventures across North and South America, Asia Pacific (including Australia), and Europe, along with holdings in publicly traded data-centre companies operating in Canada and globally.

The initial phase of the project is slated to open this month. The Globe and Mail reported that U.S.-based CoreWeave is serving as the operator of the facility, while Toronto-based AI firm Cohere is a customer.

The federal government previously committed to invest up to $240 million in Cohere. The investment marked the first allocation under Canada’s $2-billion Sovereign AI Compute Strategy launched in December 2024.

The funding supported Cohere in securing the private capital required to establish a new state-of-the-art, multi-billion-dollar AI data centre in Canada, according to the government. The facility’s location was not disclosed at the time.

According to a federal government news release, the facility will provide the domestic computing power needed for Canadian AI firms to drive innovation and maintain a competitive edge in the global race for AI breakthroughs.

Photo: Cohere