Bruce Claassen joins Kao Data as New Chief Financial Officer (CFO)
As CFO, Bruce Claassen brings over 20 years of international financial leadership experience across multinational, multisector businesses, including more than a decade focused on digital infrastructure and private equity-backed high-growth businesses. He joins Kao Data as the company continues to expand its AI-ready data centre platform across Greater London and Greater Manchester, supporting growing demand from AI and advanced computing workloads.
LONDON, Sept. 30, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Kao Data, the specialist developer and operator of data centres engineered for AI and advanced computing, has today announced that Bruce Claassen will join the company as its Chief Financial Officer (CFO) with effect from 1st October 2026.
Bruce joins Kao Data as CFO at a pivotal stage in the company's growth. Working alongside the CEO and senior leadership team, he will help scale the business in support of its ambitious plans while partnering closely with the Board and investors as new developments progress in Stockport, Greater Manchester, and Park Royal, West London, alongside the company's award-winning AI-ready campus in Harlow, Essex.
With more than 20 years of experience leading finance organisations across multinational, multisector businesses, Bruce brings a strong track record in capital investment, refinancing and building high-performing finance teams across both listed and private equity-backed businesses. He joins from Global Switch, the international data centre developer and operator, where he spent four years as Group Finance Director and most recently Acting CFO. In these roles, he led the Group's finance organisation across Europe and APAC and oversaw major refinancing programmes that supported the company's continued global expansion.
"The data centre industry is experiencing an unprecedented period of transformation, and I am excited to be joining one of the UK's leading digital infrastructure businesses as it continues to support growing demand from the AI and hyperscale cloud sectors," said Bruce Claassen, CFO, Kao Data. "I look forward to working closely with the Board, our investors and the leadership team to deliver Kao Data's long-term growth strategy, building on the company's strong foundations and reputation for developing and operating data centres engineered for AI and advanced computing workloads."
"Bruce brings extensive experience of operating within fast-paced, high-growth, private equity-backed businesses, together with deep expertise in capital investment and refinancing," said Spencer Lamb, CEO, Kao Data. "We are delighted to welcome him to Kao Data as CFO. His combination of digital infrastructure expertise, financial leadership and private equity experience makes him an excellent fit as we continue to accelerate our growth ambitions and meet increasing customer demand."
Born and raised in South Africa, Bruce moved to the UK after completing a Bachelor of Architecture (BArch) degree at the University of the Witwatersrand. He subsequently qualified as a Chartered Accountant in London and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (FCA, ICAEW). Bruce began his career in a series of complex, transformative international listed companies before spending the last decade in high-growth, private equity-backed businesses. Prior to joining Kao Data, he held senior finance leadership roles at Towergate, Worldpay, RAC and Global Switch, building extensive experience in capital investment, refinancing and business transformation.
Bruce will assume the role of Chief Financial Officer at Kao Data on 1st October 2026. For more information – visit the website.
About Kao Data
Kao Data leads the industry, pioneering the development and operation of UK and European data centres engineered for AI and advanced computing. With hyperscale-inspired facilities east and west of London, and northern England's largest data centre planned for Greater Manchester, we are home to technology's most demanding computing infrastructure.
Its award-winning, NVIDIA DGX-Ready certified data centres are designed, engineered, and operated by one of the industry's most respected teams. Together, this provides colocation customers deploying mission-critical AI, enterprise, and cloud workloads with a secure, scalable, and sustainable compute environment, backed by a guarantee of 100% uptime.
Kao Data's data centre portfolio includes more than 237 MW of IT load, either currently operational, under development or planned – all of which is under-pinned by the highest energy efficiency, sustainability and ESG credentials.
Backed by leading international investors, and with several pioneering 'industry firsts' to our name, Kao Data represents the future in industrial scale, high-capacity data centres for AI and the next generation of compute.
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