‘We’ve only just begun’: Robin Khuda’s $100bn vow for AirTrunk

AirTrunk founder and CEO Robin Khuda vows to turn the tech group into a $100bn business after selling a big chunk of the business to US private equity giant Blackstone for $24bn.

Airtrunk founder and CEO Robin Khuda with Macquarie Group boss Shemara Wikramanayake.

One of Australia’s youngest tech billionaires, Robin Khuda, will rocket towards the upper echelon of the nation’s richest elite and cement his status as one of Australia’s most successful tech entrepreneurs after the $24bn sale of AirTrunk.

The 45-year-old data centre entrepreneur would now be close to the top 50 of The List - Australia’s Richest 250 after the sale of his nine-year-old data centre business to Blackstone on Wednesday night.

Mr Khuda is understood to have held close to 11 per cent of AirTrunk, after previously selling 88 per cent of the company to Macquarie’s infrastructure arm and Canada’s PSP Investments at the start of 2020.

That was enough to have ranked 153rd on The List with an estimated $1.03bn fortune when the 2024 edition was published by The Australian in late March.

Mr Khuda is expected to reap about $500m in cash from the Blackstone deal after debt and will maintain a 5 per cent shareholding in the business and stay at its helm as chief executive.

His estimated wealth will now be up to $2.5bn, including extensive property holdings.

It is a meteoric rise given Khuda only started AirTrunk in 2015, after stints at companies like PIPE Networks and Mint Wireless.

He is now among the top half dozen wealthiest young entrepreneurs in Australia, behind only Atlassian co-founders Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar, Canva’s Melanie Perkins and Cliff Obrecht, Laurence Escalante and crypto gambling magnates Tim Heath and Edward Craven.

Mr Khuda woke up on Thursday having pulled off not only one of the largest data centre deals in the world but one of Australia’s biggest takeovers.

The 45-year-old tech entrepreneur arrived in Australia 26 years ago and built AirTrunk into a leading data centre business in the Asian region.

The sale of the company drew intense global interest from some of the world’s largest investment firms, with New York-based private equity behemoth Blackstone coming out on top.

The $24bn deal, sealed on Wednesday night is more than eight times its valuation when Macquarie Asset Management and PSP Investments picked up a joint 88 per cent stake in 2020.

Mr Khuda has kept a relatively low profile throughout the entire transaction, which has been speculated about since early this year. But on Wednesday he emerged with a message: “We’ve only just begun.”

“Today is an extremely proud moment for AirTrunk, and for me personally. Not many founders have the opportunity to build a $24bn business in less than a decade,” he wrote on LinkedIn - his first words following the blockbuster deal.

The AirTrunk acquisition was the largest Australian acquisition this year, the fifth largest in Australian history and Blackstone’s largest ever in the Asia Pacific.

Mr Khuda confirmed that he isn’t going anywhere and will continue to lead AirTrunk as its chief executive under its new ownership.

He will however sell some of his stake.

While grateful, Mr Khuda was not surprised with the rising interest in his company.

“Our relentless focus on innovation, execution, customer obsession, foresight and clear vision since Day 1 has helped us to become the largest and the most successful data centre platform in the Asia Pacific & Japan region,” he said.

“We’ve always been ahead of the game – we started building 100MW+ hyperscale data centres back in 2016 before anyone else in the region, and now we’re well positioned to capture the huge growth generated from AI and cloud workloads.”

Mr Khuda thanked AirTrunk’s 350 staff who he said helped the company build a business that was a market leader.

“Our people and unique culture of ownership is what makes us so unique and successful. It’s a privilege to lead an amazing group of AirTrunkers who are the real architects of AirTrunk’s success.”

No doubt those staff would be thanking Mr Khuda and Blackstone with staff understood to have been part of a generous employee share scheme.

Mr Khuda also thanked his outgoing investors, Macquarie Asset Management and PSP Investments, which helped dramatically increase the company’s value over a four-year period. MAM and PSP purchased an 88 per cent stake in the business in 2020 when AirTrunk was valued at $3bn.

“I am looking forward to partnering with Blackstone and CPP Investments RPC to make AirTrunk a $100bn+ business next,” Mr Khuda said.

Originally published as ‘We’ve only just begun’: Robin Khuda’s $100bn vow for AirTrunk