Equinix Acquisition of Switch & Data

Equinix, Inc., a provider of global data center services, sought to acquire Switch & Data Facilities Company, Inc., a leading provider of data center and Internet exchange services. Equinix and its counsel, Art Burke and Edward Moss of Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, retained Compass Lexecon to provide economic analysis of the transaction. Janusz Ordover, Jon Orszag, Kevin Green, and Lacey Plache, along a team from the Los Angeles office, helped the parties receive regulatory clearances from the DOJ. Compass Lexecon performed a wide ranging analysis of the competitive effects of the transaction. We provided analysis in several written submissions to the DOJ and met with DOJ staff to present our empirical analysis. This transaction was one of the first to be approved following the release of the newly revised Horizontal Merger Guidelines.