The 2026 edition of the DataCenter Forum firmly established itself as one of the most critical events dedicated to the AI and cloud data center industry in Central and Eastern Europe. With over 800 attendees and an elite lineup of guests—including NVIDIA’s Rod Evans, international energy efficiency consultant Mark Acton, and Jonathan Berney from AIC (the investment fund behind Europe’s first AI Factory)—the energy in the room was electric.
As a Gold Partner at this year’s forum, M247 Global brought a compelling vision to the table. Our team of consultants anchored the expo zone, offering visitors a comprehensive perspective on M247’s services and global coverage. However, the absolute highlight of the event was the opening panel, where M247 Global CEO Pete Wakelam sat alongside other top industry executives to analyze the local data center market and outline the bold trajectory of our company.
Here is a look at the narrative that defined M247’s presence at the forum and in the broader Romanian business media.
Unveiling a Multi-Year Vision: From Capacity Constraints to Massive Expansion
Transparency is key to building trust in the infrastructure sector. During the opening panel, Pete candidly addressed the capacity constraints that have defined the market recently, before pivoting to M247 Global’s plans for expansion.
I'm happy to open the panel. So, for M247, anyone who knows us well will know the local market for us in the last one to two years has been one where we've said 'sorry, the demand's really high and we've got no space'. Thankfully, as I talk today, that situation has changed for us," Pete stated. "M247 Global is investing big to make sure we meet the demand today and in the long term. And we're seeing the demands from the service level and the quality and the professionalism grow as well. So that's where M247 Global has been and where we're going."
This commitment isn't just rhetoric. Pete outlined a multi-year strategy involving tens of millions of euros in investments. This aggressive roadmap includes bringing additional power and capacity to our existing Pipera data center, alongside expanding into new facilities.
A cornerstone of this strategy is the recent acquisition of a data center in Brașov, a move designed to drastically enhance our disaster recovery offerings.
"We're feeling really confident in deploying a multi-year strategy where we'll invest tens of millions of euros to make sure that we not only meet the demand today — so that's where Brașov comes in, and that enables us to provide enhanced disaster recovery services to our customers and really bolster that, because I think we're all, as decision-makers and C-suite executives in an ever-changing world, realizing even more so the importance of resilience."
Proud Romanian Roots, Unmatched Global Reach
A recurring theme throughout the panel was correcting a common misconception about M247 Global's identity. Despite the international-sounding name and a massive footprint across five continents, M247 is, at its core, a Romanian success story.
"Our roots are in Romania, our headquarters are here in Bucharest. The leadership team and the decisions that we make on investing and that global reach all sits here, and it's built on decades of operating within Romania," Pete emphasized during the panel.
This deep local expertise is combined with a global network that serves as a massive differentiator. Pete broke down exactly what this means for our clients:
"Most people would define us as a business that is edge compute nodes and data storage distributed globally, connected through an IP network across five continents. We're in 47 key locations. And what that means is our customers who do business with us within Romania, they can break out to those markets really easily."
This unique positioning allows M247 to not only empower Romanian businesses to scale globally but also to attract international business into the Romanian market—driving the digital economy forward. Furthermore, Pete announced that later this year, M247 will launch a new EU-sovereign cloud platform (public and private), ensuring that we continue to move up the value chain alongside our SaaS partners.
M247 CEO at ZF Live: Taking the Message beyond the Forum
Following the panel at the DataCenter Forum, Pete Wakelam was invited to the ZF Live TV booth, hosted by Ziarul Financiar, Romania’s premier business magazine. This provided the perfect platform to broadcast M247’s identity and strategic roadmap to the broader business community
When asked to define exactly who M247 Global is, Pete provided a clear, powerful summary of our hybrid identity as both a global network and a local infrastructure powerhouse:
“If I describe us as a business that has edge compute and data storage nodes around the world, interconnected by an IP transit network. So we operate across five continents, we're present in 47 key locations... But we also, from a Romanian perspective, we're an IT infrastructure provider. So we've got multiple data centers within the Romanian marketplace, and we're investing more in that right now because we see the demand in the market.”
He reiterated the importance of the Brașov acquisition—framing it as "phase one" of the new execution strategy—and doubled down on the Romanian heritage of the brand:
"Yeah, well, M247 Global is a Romanian company. We have been operating for a couple of decades, we're headquartered here in Bucharest, and we have lots of clients within our infrastructure and in our cloud platform."
The Path Forward
Whether speaking to a room of 800 tech professionals or broadcasting to the nation's top business leaders, M247 Global's message was consistent, clear, and incredibly ambitious. We are a Romanian business with a global backbone, and we are investing heavily to ensure that as the digital economy evolves—fueled by advancements like AI—we are the trusted partner facilitating that growth. As Pete perfectly summarized: "That's our real job, I think."