DartPoints Gets Majority Investment from Astra Capital Management

A Dallas-based owner and operator of edge colocation data centers has received a majority investment from a private equity firm.

Washington, DC-based Astra Capital Management aims to invest in businesses that see growth in communications and technology. The firm says it targets “highly scalable companies with proven business models that have positive free cash flow and significant growth potential.”

Founded in 2012, DartPoints Holding Company does just that—the local startup saw that edge colocation data centers could provide access to a large number of carriers, offering “an ecosystem where content, cloud providers, commerce and population centers can meet.”

More than 50 percent of enterprise data will be processed outside of the traditional data center or cloud by 2022, according to Gartner. Traditional data centers traditionally are meant to give highly populated cities access to space and power to store data.

But with edge colocation data centers, storage and processing can occur closer to users, which DartPoints says enables better, faster, and more predictable real-time interactions. It also works beyond the largest Tier I cities.

“DartPoints is an innovator in the data center industry, which is undergoing significant evolutionary changes,” Brian Kirschbaum, a partner at Astra. “Application performance, cost and resiliency are forcing customers toward a more distributed IT infrastructure.”

Astra’s investment will support DartPoints’s expansion across North America. Using a buy and build strategy, the new team plans to acquire existing data centers and the build-out of edge colocation data centers.

The move makes telecom veteran Scott Willis DartPoints’ new president, CEO and a board member, effective immediately. Willis was most recently the CEO of Dallas-based Zinwave, which has a platform that’s the industry’s only in-building wireless system that supports all current public safety and cellular frequencies.

“Astra’s expertise, capital and global network combined with Scott’s leadership and vision will fuel our growth and help us meet the increasing need for edge colocation data centers,” Hugh Carspecken, DartPoints’ founder and chief strategy officer, said.

Several other seasoned telecommunications investors and execs will also now join DartPoints’s board: Brian Kirschbaum, an Astra partner; Kevin Beebe, Astra co-founder and partner; and Scott Bergs, the former CEO of Neutral Path Communications and COO of Midwest Wireless.