How to write a colocation RFP that operators can answer

Datacenter capacity is sold as power. State the IT load you need on day one, in kW or MW, rather than a number of racks or square metres. An operator can tell from one figure whether a hall can carry you; a floor area tells them very little.

If you only know rack counts, multiply them by the power each rack will draw. A rough figure is far more useful than none.

Give the month you need the first capacity and, if you expect to grow, the target and when you expect to reach it. Readiness is often what separates two otherwise similar sites, and an expansion path tells an operator whether you fit one hall or a campus.

The power each rack draws, in kW per rack, rules sites in or out faster than anything else. Ordinary servers use a few kilowatts per rack; AI and GPU racks often need 40 kW or more.

High densities usually need liquid cooling: rear-door heat exchangers, direct liquid cooling to the chips, or immersion. If you know what your hardware needs, say so; if you don't, the density figure lets operators suggest it.

Tier and redundancy describe how a site keeps running when something fails. N+1 has one spare unit; 2N duplicates everything. Higher resilience costs more, so ask for what your workload needs rather than the maximum. Training clusters that checkpoint their work often need less than systems that must never stop.

Say which countries or regions work for you and why: latency to users, data residency, or energy. Wider is better at first. You can narrow down once you see which sites answer.

If you need renewable power, heat reuse or certifications such as ISO 27001, include them. These are often deciding factors for public or listed companies, and listings state them, so they are part of how a site is scored.

Price, contract structure and the exact fit-out are better discussed once you know which sites fit. An RFP that leaves them open gets more answers, not fewer. On AICapacity, only power, timing and workload are required.

You don't have to announce your plans to the market to get answers. On AICapacity, operators see your requirements and industry, never your name, until you choose to engage. If you want an NDA before sharing more, start from our mutual NDA template.