How eStruxture Turned Canada into a Data Centre Powerhouse

Canada is emerging as a powerhouse in the global data centre industry. At the forefront of this transformation is eStruxture, the country's largest data centre provider, which is executing an ambitious strategy to position Canada as a premier destination for digital infrastructure.

Todd Coleman founded eStruxture in February 2017. As Founder, Chairman, President and CEO, he leads a company that now operates 16 facilities across four major Canadian markets. Today, the business serves more than 750 corporate customers, ranging from small enterprises to the world's largest hyperscalers.

"We founded the company with the notion that power densities were going to increase over the years, and more importantly, data was going to localise in Canada," Todd explains. 

A lawyer by training, Todd jokingly describes himself as "a recovering lawyer" who made the transition to entrepreneurship, where he has since made a name for himself in the tech sector.

"The benefits of being a lawyer is it teaches you how to think," he says. "It teaches you to ask a lot of questions, being comfortable not knowing what you don't know." That questioning mindset served him well as he moved from law to technology.

Todd's path into data centres began on the fibre optic side of telecommunications. He learned how data centres function at the network level, particularly their role in traffic exchange. This led to him co-founding Cologix, a data centre provider, before founding eStruxture. His experience living through the dot-com bubble proved instructive. "Telecoms were haemorrhaging billions of dollars a year," he recalls. "You learn a lot about what not to do."

That experience shaped eStruxture's focused approach. "We do five things and we do it really, really well," Todd explains. "We don't chase bright, shiny objects and get them to 60% complete and then get distracted."

Taylor Hammond, Chief Commercial Officer at eStruxture, joined the company in August 2024 and has been a key part of the company’s success in the past 18 months. His responsibilities span everything from corporate strategy and site selection to power procurement and capital structure. Like Todd, Taylor arrived in the industry via an unconventional route. He trained as a mechanical engineer before finding his way into investment banking, where he often worked with telcos.

"I met the eStruxture team in 2019, had a chance to work together on a number of transactions," he explains. The relationship evolved over time, and Taylor moved from being the team’s banking advisor to become one of its most core members. 

At a wide angle, the company describes itself as a carrier and cloud-neutral data centre operator, designing, building and operating critical infrastructure for its customers. "We’re built on a foundation to serve financial, enterprise and government customers," says Taylor. Over the years, business has expanded into hyperscale markets, establishing preferred provider relationships with some of the world’s largest cloud computing companies.

As Canada’s largest data centre company, eStruxture’s national identity is an important part of its story and its business model. “We are 100% Canadian,” says Taylor. “We share connections, we pull off tight timelines. It really comes down to relationships and partnerships.”

Todd emphasises this relational approach extends beyond contracts. "For us, it's really a handshake, and it's a belief system on how we treat our partners and how we expect to be treated in return," he explains. These partnerships span manufacturers like Vertiv, which produces data centre infrastructure equipment, service providers, banking relationships and government entities at federal, provincial and municipal levels.

The company's customer relationships reflect this philosophy. "Many of them view us as their strategic development partner across Canada," Todd says. This includes both local and global customers. The trust factor proves critical in an industry where infrastructure investments run into billions.