The last quarter of 2026 is crowded with decisions for Australia's data centre market. Firmus, the AI factory builder, began investor meetings for an ASX float on 8 September, energy ministers take up the rules on what new power a data centre must bring in September, the New South Wales inquiry reports on 30 September, and the national energy rule maker decides large-load access standards on 29 October. In May this publication put six predictions on the quarter to September. Here are six for the quarter to 31 December, each with the indicators behind it and the case against, followed by the score on the May set.
The biggest call is that Firmus lists before Christmas worth more than NEXTDC, which would make a company whose first owned data centre opens in 2027 worth more than any listed Australian data centre operator. The scorecard further down is why the calls below lean on companies and capital rather than government timetables. The May calls about capacity came in early. The ones that put a date on a listing or a government process are still waiting.
Six calls to 31 December 2026
1. Firmus lists on the ASX worth more than NEXTDC. Firmus was valued at US$5.5 billion in May. On 7 August it closed a US$2 billion round at more than US$10.5 billion, and on 8 September it began investor meetings for a float the Financial Review reports is pitched at A$15.5 billion or more, on more than 900MW of customer commitments and a named contract with OpenAI. NEXTDC was worth about A$11.5 billion on the ASX in June, and on 9 September, two weeks after its NEXTDC FY26 results, it launched a A$1.1 billion convertible note offer, reported as its third raise in four months. Offshore, Nscale, a two-year-old British AI cloud company, is raising at US$30 billion on US$33 million of 2025 revenue and Sydney-founded IREN closed on 8 September worth US$18.5 billion on Nasdaq. The case against: institutions were still arguing over escrow, the lock-up on existing holders' shares after a float, when the meetings began; Sharon AI's ASX listing was targeted for mid-June, then late July, then August, and has yet to price; and Goodman, DigiCo and Megaport all fell on their results days in August, which suggests the listed market pays less than the private one for data centre growth.
2. The next ten AI factory announcements average under 150MW and sit on former industrial sites. AI factories are the AI data centres built to run large clusters of NVIDIA chips, and this publication's call is that their sites are moving. Sharon AI bought the closed Ettamogah paper mill at Albury from Visy in September, a site with power and water in place, and has not said what it will build there. Firmus is building three sites in northern Tasmania, one of them 52MW at Wesley Vale, out of prefabricated modules made at a Queanbeyan factory, and Tasmania says six companies want 705MW between them, which averages about 120MW each. AEMO puts a large transmission connection at about two years, New South Wales wants A$200,000 a megawatt for connections between Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong and half that everywhere else, and Transgrid, which runs the state's high-voltage grid, said on 10 September that it is pointing new data centre load to Lithgow and the regions, which is why a site with a connection already built matters. The case against: AEMO's connection queue is 9GW across 17 projects, an average above 500MW, so the projects with money behind them are still large.
3. Queensland becomes the first state to sell power to an AI campus straight from its own generators, and Anthropic is the customer. Anthropic closed bids on a 1.4GW Australian tender in March, an Infrastructure NSW email shows its chief executive wanted to discuss up to 5GW outside Sydney, and Premier David Crisafulli met the company and OpenAI in Sacramento on 3 September. His offer has two conditions, that developers pay for the extra generation the state-owned utilities build and that campuses go outside built-up areas. Queensland still owns its power stations, as do Tasmania, Western Australia and the Northern Territory; New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia sold theirs. First ministers' 26 August statement lets a jurisdiction supply from government-owned generators where it can show the grid stays steady and prices stay lower, Swanbank is wired for up to 1.2GW, and a 1.44GW campus was filed at Kogan on 17 August. The case against: the Sacramento talks ended with an agreement to "explore", and the offer asks developers to pay for generation the state builds, a bill no AI company has yet agreed to.
4. Beetaloo's 2GW gas campus in the Territory goes ahead behind the meter. Federal energy minister Chris Bowen told the National Press Club on 5 August that a data centre running only on gas could not register or proceed. Beetaloo Digital's plan at Weddell, 30km from Darwin, from a subsidiary of the ASX-listed gas company Beetaloo Energy, is up to 2GW of on-site generation drawing nothing from the Territory grid, the Northern Territory has granted the land, its minister Josh Burgoyne called Bowen's plan federal overreach, and the rule maker's own implementation estimate runs 24 to 36 months against legislation targeted for early 2027. On this publication's reading, a campus that never connects to the grid has nothing to register, and that is the design. The case against: there is no tenant, no partner and no development approval, and the proponent is a pre-revenue gas company whose first commercial gas is targeted for late 2026.
5. The next hyperscaler region is Brisbane, and Adelaide is second. Sydney's vacancy is 2.2 per cent on Cushman's count and 61 per cent of the national pipeline is pre-leased, and Transgrid said on 10 September that it has signed 1.5GW of data centre connections, holds 20GW of enquiries, and has no further Sydney capacity until a transmission project due in the mid-2030s. Brisbane has three things Sydney is short of: a premier courting OpenAI and Anthropic in person, state-owned generators, Swanbank wired for up to 1.2GW about 40km from the city, and a 1.44GW campus filed at Kogan. Adelaide is the training-campus alternative, with IREN's 800MW at Bundey, Firmus holding 600MW of South Australian power under contract from mid-2027 for about 1.3GW of load near Port Augusta, and ElectraNet counting about 2,500MW of probable new industrial load by 2035. Microsoft has pledged A$25 billion and Amazon A$20 billion for Australia to 2029, and AirTrunk named Google, Apple, Meta, Amazon and Microsoft as Australian prospects on 7 September. The case against: data centres are sited for customers, 14GW of enquiries sit within 12km of Sydney West, and Melbourne is the only other Australian city where Amazon, Microsoft and Google all run a cloud region, as of September 2026.
6. Australia's AI compute providers put their next gigawatt in Southeast Asia. Firmus is building a 360MW campus in Batam sized for up to 170,000 NVIDIA GPUs, has two Malaysian sites with OpenAI as anchor customer, and runs a leased site in Singapore. AirTrunk closed US$2.325 billion for Johor in July and NEXTDC opened in Kuala Lumpur in May. The neocloud providers in Australia are selling to American AI companies buying capacity near Singapore, which is short of the land and power to build it. The case against: Project Southgate is 1.6GW in Australia and none of it is finished, and Johor has limited new approvals to air-cooled projects, while Firmus cools its AI factories by immersion.
How the May calls fared
May prediction | What happened | Score |
|---|---|---|
Neocloud pipeline crosses 2GW before September | IREN's 800MW Bundey agreement on 3 June took it past 2GW; NVIDIA put its eight Australian partners at up to 2GW by 2027 on 9 September | Held |
The DCA and DC Byte forecast becomes the policy reference | AEMO's June system plan and August outlook used AEMO's own demand figures. Issue 2 of the forecast is not out; the NSW inquiry reports on 30 September | Held in part |
Australia narrows on certification, New Zealand grows alongside | Certification did not move. New Zealand did: BCG lifted its forecast past a gigawatt and Datagrid started building 280MW on 18 August | Held in part |
Liquid cooling becomes the default above 50MW | Australian disclosures do not state the cooling method, so the call cannot be scored. AirTrunk names direct-to-chip cooling for its NVIDIA shells; Johor limited approvals to air-cooled projects | Not scoreable |
Sharon AI lists mid-June, Firmus in June or July | Neither has priced. Firmus raised US$2 billion privately on 7 August and began float meetings on 8 September; Sharon AI trades on Nasdaq and its ASX listing is still ahead | Missed |
Hosting certification reform ships by Q3 | New certifications have been paused since 3 November 2025. Home Affairs consulted existing providers on a revised deed in April and has published no reopening date | Missed |
Source: company announcements, Department of Home Affairs, AEMO, Data Centres Australia and DC Byte, May to September 2026.
IREN's Bundey deal took the pipeline past 2GW three months early. IREN signed a transmission connection agreement for up to 800MW at Bundey on 3 June, which with Firmus's 1.6GW Project Southgate carried the neocloud pipeline past the line, and NVIDIA's 9 September statement put eight Australian partners at up to 2GW by 2027. Firmus raised privately at nearly twice its May valuation in the window the May piece had pencilled in for a float.
AEMO used its own figures rather than the industry forecast. Its 2026 Integrated System Plan and August reliability outlook tripled data centre consumption to about 15TWh by 2029-30 against 67GW of proposed connections and about 1.6GW of data centres in Australia finished to date. The forecast's split of real from early-stage capacity was adopted anyway: it is the argument CDC's Jack Dan put to CEDA on 25 June, and AEMO's 3.9GW of constant draw against 67GW states it from the regulator's side. New Zealand did what the May piece expected, with BCG lifting its forecast past a gigawatt and Datagrid starting construction at Makarewa on 18 August, while Johor limited approvals to air-cooled projects, the opposite of the May cooling call.
What to watch
Firmus's prospectus settles the first call. Sharon AI's next word on Albury, Tasmania's 12 October close on its data centre expectations and the names behind its 705MW test the second. Queensland's next word on the Sacramento talks, a first named partner at Weddell, and any cloud region announcement in Brisbane or Adelaide settle the third, fourth and fifth. The six will be scored here in January 2027.