Kao Data has secured a 10-year, 22MW AI infrastructure deployment with Nebius at its Harlow data centre campus, valued at part of Nebius's £1.7 billion UK investment. The agreement will support AI innovation in UK academic and research communities, aligned with the government's AI Opportunities Action Plan. Nebius, a NASDAQ-listed AI cloud company, will host its AI Cloud platform and Token Factory inference service at the facility. The deployment will be powered by 100% renewable energy and utilise direct-to-chip liquid cooling to minimise water usage. Kao Data's Harlow campus hosts the UK's largest cluster of advanced AI and research computing workloads. The company has 237MW of IT load operational, under development or planned across its portfolio, with future facilities planned in West London, Greater Manchester and Harlow.

https://www.prnewswire.co.uk/news-releases/kao-data-appoints-spencer-lamb-as-chief-executive-officer-302785591.html. Kao Data appoints Spencer Lamb as Chief Executive Officer. * Long-standing industry leader appointed CEO of the UK's preeminent data centre platform, engineered for AI. * During his tenure, Spencer has successfully led the company's go-to-market strategy, securing significant customer wins across the cloud, AI, and enterprise sectors, establishing Kao Data as the UK's home for industrial-scale computing. * Will lead the organisation with Kao Data Founder and Executive Chairman, David Bloom, building the capital structures, partnerships and relationships that will underpin and accelerate the company's long-term growth strategy. LONDON, May 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ - Kao Data, the specialist developer and operator of data centres engineered for AI and advanced computing, has today announced the appointment of Spencer Lamb as its Chief Executive Officer, completing a leadership evolution designed to accelerate the company's next phase of growth. With more than 20 years' experience within the international data centre industry, and having joined Kao Data in January 2020, Spencer steps up from his previous role as Managing Director and CCO, taking the helm alongside Founder and Executive Chair, David Bloom, to lead one of the UK's foremost developers and operators of AI-ready infrastructure. As CEO, Spencer will lead day-to-day operational leadership and growth execution across Kao Data's expanding UK platform, driving the continued development of its AI-ready data centre capacity and ensuring the company's design and delivery model keeps pace with the rapidly changing demands of AI and high-density compute. He will work together with David, who continues in his operational role as Executive Chairman, focused on the work that will determine the direction and evolution of the Kao Data platform, including the capital structures, partnerships and relationships that underpin the company's long-term growth strategy. During the last six years at Kao Data, Spencer has successfully led the company's go-to-market strategy, securing significant customer wins across the cloud, AI, enterprise and financial services spaces, and developed its Harlow campus into one of the UK's leading homes for HPC, AI, scientific research and life sciences compute. As a member of the company's Senior Management Team, Spencer has also played a pivotal role in helping grow Kao Data into a multi-site portfolio spanning Harlow, Slough, Northolt, Park Royal in West London, Greater Manchester and further sites under development. More recently, Spencer has proactively championed the development of homegrown AI infrastructure within the UK and has become one of the most trusted and respected figures within the data centre industry. A frequent spokesperson for the country's AI ambitions, he has spent considerable time working with local and central government to build a key understanding of the critical role data centres play within the UK's digital economy, and how they must develop in parallel with both the national grid and the UK's energy expansion plans to enable the UK's AI and economic growth. Spencer Lamb, Chief Executive Officer at Kao Data, said: "I have loved my time at Kao Data, and I am excited to step up and lead the company as its CEO. One of the biggest strengths of Kao Data is our 'player-manager' mentality, recruiting from within to develop and grow our people, which is exactly what this role calls for. I am looking forward to ensuring Kao Data continues to play a strong and defining role in the UK's AI infrastructure story, and that we keep delivering for our customers, our people and the communities we operate in." David Bloom, Executive Chairman at Kao Data, said: "Spencer's appointment formalises what has been an increasingly natural evolution in how we lead this business. He has the DNA of this company and is, quite simply, a 'Kao person' through and through and an outstanding leader in this industry. As CEO, Spencer will drive Kao Data's operations and day-to-day growth strategy, while I remain directly focused on the strategic priorities that will shape our next chapter: major financing, capital partnerships, M&A, and our ongoing engagement with government on the UK's AI infrastructure agenda. This is a leadership structure built deliberately for scale, and I am excited about what we will build together." Spencer's appointment as Chief Executive Officer is effective immediately. For more information about Kao Data, visit the website. About Kao Data Kao Data leads the industry, pioneering the development and operation of UK and European data centres engineered for AI and advanced computing. With hyperscale-inspired facilities east and west of London, and northern England's largest data centre planned for Greater Manchester, Teitimes is home to technology's most demanding computing infrastructure. Its award-winning, NVIDIA DGX-Ready certified data centres are designed, engineered, and operated by one of the industry's most respected teams. Together, this provides colocation customers deploying mission-critical AI, enterprise, and cloud workloads with a secure, scalable, and sustainable compute environment, backed by a guarantee of 100% uptime. Kao Data's data centre portfolio includes more than 160 MW of IT load, either currently operational, under development or planned - all of which is under-pinned by the highest energy efficiency, sustainability and ESG credentials. Backed by leading international investors, and with several pioneering 'industry firsts' to its name, Kao Data represents the future in industrial scale, high-capacity data centres for AI and the next generation of compute. Kaodata.com

Critical Careers steps up from campaign to industry-wide movement. AVK, Eversheds Sutherland, JLL and Mace Construct join founding strategic partner CBRE, to support Kao Data's women in digital infrastructure initiative ahead of the next podcast season launch. * Thursday, 21st May 2026 Posted 1 day ago in by Phil Alsop Critical Careers, the industry initiative launched by Kao Data to champion women in digital infrastructure, has announced the expansion of its partner ecosystem with four new strategic partners joining the founding strategic partner, CBRE Data Center Solutions. AVK, Eversheds Sutherland, JLL and Mace Construct will, alongside CBRE Data Center Solutions, support Critical Careers through 2026/27 as the programme moves into its second year, enabling a broader range of activity, including two new podcast seasons and live events across Europe's major data centre hubs. Spa Communications joins the programme as media partner, supporting the initiative's external reach and industry engagement. Originally launched to celebrate women working across the sector, Critical Careers has grown into a platform where competing operators, global hyperscalers, neoclouds and supply chain partners collaborate under a shared purpose. The initiative brings together voices from across engineering, operations, sustainability, law and finance, real estate and executive leadership, reframing representation as a collective responsibility rather than a single-company effort. That growth is reflected in the programme's reach. The first Critical Careers book featured 30 women from 28 companies across six continents, with a supporting digital platform giving the stories a global audience and reaching over 1.5 million impressions across LinkedIn. Following on from this success the first podcast season generated thousands of downloads and achieved a conversion rate four times higher than the Spotify average, reaching an audience that was 68 per cent female across the UK, US and continental Europe. Lizzy McDowell, Director of Marketing at Kao Data and co-founder of Critical Careers, said: "Critical Careers began as a genuine celebration of women in digital infrastructure, and the response across the industry made it clear that the work had a role to play well beyond any single organisation. Having CBRE Data Centre Solutions, AVK, Eversheds Sutherland, JLL and Mace Construct as strategic partners, provides us with the necessary endorsement we required to expand the Critical Careers mission, who it reaches, how it shapes the industry's future and the lasting impact we can have." Joyce Wady, Critical Careers Creative Director, added: "Through the conversations I've had with women across the Critical Careers books and podcast, one thing has become very clear. Access to this industry does not start with a job description, it starts with visibility. When you can see what careers in digital infrastructure actually look like, including the roles, journeys and people behind them, it becomes much easier to imagine yourself within it. What Digitalisation World is doing with Critical Careers is turning that visibility into belief. By opening up how careers really take shape, Digitalisation World is challenging outdated perceptions and showing that women belong in this industry and are already building long-term, successful careers within it. The more visible these stories become, the more realistic and achievable that future is for others coming through." Critical Careers has already demonstrated tangible influence on recruitment, with women entering digital infrastructure roles after engaging with its content. The expanded strategic partner group now gives the initiative the collective weight to build on that momentum, scaling its reach across the industry and beyond, throughout the year ahead.