Although CBRE and Digital Realty do not have a strict timeline for this preliminary work, Bateman says it will last at least a couple of months. “Finding out exactly what the market needs and wants is the exercise here.”

However, he is very confident that tenants will be eager to grab space in the planned 12-story annex to the Lakeside Technology Center. “This building will provide a zero-latency connection, no delay, to 350 E. Cermak, which is one of the most important buildings to the Internet. That makes this one of the most compelling development sites in North America, and for that matter, the world.”

Digital Realty's flagship center is most popular with financial services firms, content providers and telecommunications firms. And Bateman expects that, at least initially, these groups will form the lion's share of those that express interest in the new development.

There seems little doubt that the Chicago region has enough demand to justify the creation of new data centers. 350 E. Cermak has essentially been 100% leased for at least a decade, Bateman points out, and the regional vacancy rate currently hovers around 4%.

And the market conditions in Chicago mirrors what's happening across the nation. “In most markets, we see no deficit in supply compared with demand,” he says. In fact, “we have not seen a business cycle when developers have built beyond demand.”