 Hi everyone and welcome to a special episode of JSA TV with Stream Data Centers where we will explore how to deliver a great data center experience at the intersection of valuable partnerships and mission critical service. I'm Barb Mitchell of JSA and joining me today is the managing director dynamic duo at Stream Realty Partners, Mike Armstrong and Michael sometimes also referred to sometimes known as Wong and Strong. Together these two gentlemen deliver more than 35 years of real estate investment experience helping Stream to scale seamlessly and deliver expanded value on behalf of its data center customers. Thank you both so much for joining us. So I thought that you know you you both deserve a little bit more of an introduction than that. So just before we get into the questions I just want to you know give everyone a little bit more of a background on you. So of course Mike Armstrong and Michael Wong joined Stream Realty Partners which is the parent company of Stream Data Centers last September. Both have deep experience in real estate acquisition and new business development across multiple property types. The two first worked together as co-heads of acquisition for GI Partners technology real estate platform which they were intimately involved in growing from inception to an 8 million square foot portfolio of data center life science and technology office assets across the United States. What a pleasure it is to have you here with us today and you know a big move for you both I think you know I'd be really interested I think our viewers would be interested to hear you know with with your backgrounds and your you know amazing reputations across the industry. What led you to join Stream last year? Mike do you want to start first? Yeah absolutely and it's a it's a simple answer there's the people as we all know real estate your data centers it's a very relationship forward business and over the years we had you got to know the folks here both on the Stream Realty Partners side and on the Stream Data Center side quite well you know out and about at conferences and industry events and then more intimately you know looking at deals or working on deals together and it just became apparent that Stream was a different type of place everyone cared about each other it was almost palpable when you were with them the energy that the team exuded and I think this wanted to be a part of that and I'm glad to report inside the firm just as good as it looked from the outside. Right I thought it was a pretty easy decision as well I mean the the folks here are just so passionate about what they do and talented in terms of product expertise and market expertise and and you really get a sense of that when you talk to anyone ranging from you know a critical engineering person at the firm on the data center side to the head of the firm to the various offices or heads of offices on the office and investor real side they're all willing to support what you're trying to do within Stream happy to share what they're working on and just great people to get them out. Yeah you know what I've heard that so consistently about Stream about the team and the people it's nice to hear that that's going strong and so it's been over six months now for you both here into the second half of your of your first year with Stream how's it been so far any key highlights for us Mike that you wanted to share? Yeah you know consistent with the rest of the world it's been a just obviously a very extraordinary year with the pandemic overlay and you know Stream you know Wong Strong here we're no we're no different starting at a new company you in the middle of a pandemic can certainly present challenges but so far so good it's been great everyone's been very supportive as Michael mentioned just allowing you know us to seamlessly integrate from afar to start and and now that things are starting to open up we're really excited and optimistic of you know what's to come. I love my current office needs my family and my two dogs and my kids get go but I can't wait to trade them in to be able to go out and see properties and meet with folks again and this has been a good step for us to be getting back on that track so really looking forward to that. Yeah isn't that true right I think we're all looking forward to a little normalcy returning for everyone and later you know in 2021. Mike can you tell us about your role within Stream Realty Partners and how exactly that ties into Stream data centers? Yeah absolutely so Michael and I sit inside of the SRP investment team an SRP as you mentioned is the parent company to Stream data centers but really in a practical sense we say at the intersection of data centers and investments and so what that means practically is you know helping you know further you know converge and kind of level up both of those businesses as we you know we hope to scale and grow in service of our clients and so sourcing data center opportunities you know hopefully building some differentiated products in that space and then you know fast forward I'm sure we'll be doing something completely different and you know five or ten years inside the organization. I like that term level up. Yeah it's not criminal. And so considering you know the experience you both bring to Stream from from your past how is that what do you think there's the benefit that that will bring to the customers and investors at Stream Michael? Great question you know the data center investment arena has changed quite dramatically since we've been involved with it and you know we've only been involved with it for half the period that the Stream data center team has been involved with that segment of the market so it's been pretty dynamic and we're seeing a lot of new capital coming into the space and so the ability to interact with those types of investors relates what we're seeing on the data center side to other types of properties that may be maybe more familiar with such as office and industrial and then also to display both the expertise here internally at Stream but not just from a market perspective from a from a operational you know facility management development leasing marketing you know wholly integrated package I think has been really useful for us as we get back out there and start talking to users and potential sellers and potential investors. And Mike how do you feel how do you think this extends out I mean you know building off of what Michael was saying there to the industry as a whole and the future of Stream you know again no pressure putting on the two of you to evolve the entire industry but what do you think what do you see there? Yeah you know we obviously don't have a crystal ball and if we do it's probably not a very good one but we think that over time our ability to help our clients help our partners and we use partners is very inclusive term here partners could be investors partners can be our tenants in many cases but we want to help them grow their business and by doing that grow grow our business and so as you know we look down the road year five and year ten where I think this is going is we're going to build a franchise that people can think of it really just as a solution where a user can come to stream and whether that is they have a very specific need maybe they need office space or they need an industrial solution or they need a data center you know we want to think of ourselves as a you know a one-stop shop not to use a often overplayed term but just to be helpful where our customers and clients come to us for advice and partnership that's a good point I think some users or tenants they just want to landlord they don't want you in their business at all and other other tenants or users they want a partner they need someone that can help them manage the infrastructure and here at stream we're able to do all of that we can serve as more of a real estate partner we can serve as more of an operational data center partner and everything in between so it's a very exciting platform for us to be a part of and and Mike I know you said I think I heard you say you don't have a crystal ball but if you if you did if either of you did um what's the next five years look like you know if we're sitting here talking five years from now what do you think we're talking about uh yes oh my goodness um you know I think in in concrete terms I think we will uh have an expanded footprint um you know Michael and I live in northern California and so I would expect us to have uh more offices in California on the west coast basically wherever our clients are in need help I could see an expanded office footprint across the company you know more differentiated investment solutions that's a office industrial data centers and maybe some other product types as well and just you know a growing vibrant business I wouldn't be surprised if Michael and I are doing something bigger or different inside the organization as we can help it grow stronger stronger the advantages of working at a you know a very privately um you know very tightly held private company you know we're we're able to be nimble we're able to be entrepreneurial we can you know we can shift where we think the better opportunities are you know or as we see uh user needs change or evolve um and similarly to investor you know demands and and and you know requirements so I think you know a lot of good things for us to come like the growth has been you know phenomenal over the past few years and Mike and I are very excited to be a part of it going forward well we we certainly all look forward to to seeing to watching that growth seeing this all unfold and to you know meeting back here in five years and and seeing if your your crystal ball was right uh so thank you both again Michael Wong and Mike Armstrong thank you so much for joining us and sharing your expertise with us here today and thank you viewers for tuning in for more insightful content please visit stream data centers dot com and you can of course head to the resource library for all of your info all of your information needs thank you so much for joining us