WhiteFiber pays $60M to turn North Carolina textile plants into data centers

Data Center Dynamics reported that WhiteFiber, an AI cloud firm backed by Bit Digital, has signed a definitive agreement to buy two industrial properties in Yadkin County, North Carolina, for $60 million. The company plans to retrofit both into data centers.

The seller is Unifi Manufacturing, which is carving out about 120 acres and 500,000 square feet of warehouse space across the two sites. WhiteFiber will run the campuses as NC-2 and NC-3, each designed for 30 megawatts of initial gross utility capacity, for a combined 60MW minimum. The company wants initial ready-for-service capacity by the third quarter of 2027.

The properties could eventually support up to 200MW of combined gross utility capacity, WhiteFiber said. The purchase goes through Enovum Data Centers, a wholly owned subsidiary, and is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2026.

The sites sit about 55 miles from WhiteFiber's NC-1 campus in Madison, a 40MW facility that went live over the summer in another building Unifi once used for manufacturing. "This agreement is an important next step in scaling WhiteFiber's data center platform," CEO Sam Tabar said. The proximity, he added, lets the company build on relationships and capabilities already established in the region.

A $60 million carve-out buys a standing asset. The buildings are warehouses, not open fields. Unifi said the transaction would have minimal operational impact and create no downtime in its daily work, while letting the textile company shed real estate that is not central to its business. Unifi's own announcement framed the sale as a step toward a leaner, more profitable organization.

For WhiteFiber, the play is about compressing the timeline. The deal closes in Q4 2026 and initial capacity is targeted less than a year later—a pace that likely reflects the head start of existing structures and the utility groundwork already in place. In the data center business, time and power are the scarce inputs.

The constellation of sites—a 40MW facility in Madison and the two new campuses 55 miles away—suggests a strategy of distributed capacity rather than a single megacampus. That approach may ease permitting and financing, though it multiplies operational complexity. WhiteFiber's statement emphasized working closely with local stakeholders, language that hints at the importance of community acceptance for these conversions.

For private market investors, the deal is a small case study in how AI infrastructure is becoming a real estate trade. WhiteFiber is paying for buildings and utility capacity, not just compute. The economics will be familiar to anyone who has invested in industrial property: existing infrastructure commands a premium because it shortens time to revenue.

The next thing to watch is whether WhiteFiber can secure the utility upgrades needed to push NC-2 and NC-3 from 60MW of initial capacity toward the 200MW potential. The buildings are bought; the power is the long pole.