Professional services firm Marsh has formed a new unit focused on the digital infrastructure market.

The launch marks one of the company’s first major business milestones since its rebrand at the start of the year. The new unit, which is known as the Digital Infrastructure Contract Advisory Group, comprises former attorneys, insurance specialists and other professionals. 

The largest digital infrastructure deals being signed nowadays are AI data center projects. However, the term also encompasses many other initiatives. Upgrades to an internet provider’s network, for example, also qualify as a digital infrastructure investment. That part of the market is not drawing as much attention as data centers but is likewise seeing elevated deal activity levels.

Marsh’s new unit will help companies draft the contracts involved in digital infrastructure projects. In particular, the group will focus on the unexpected costs that can arise from those contracts. Construction mistakes, for example, can increase the price of building a data center by millions of dollars. Marsh will work with clients to ensure that such unexpected costs are covered by their insurance policies.

“Managing contracts in the digital infrastructure sector – such as service-level agreements and power purchase agreements – is inherently complex and time-intensive, often requiring specialized expertise that many clients may not have in-house,” Mike Mathews, the global digital infrastructure practice leader at Marsh, told Boardroom Insight. “Our Digital Infrastructure Contract Advisory Group is designed to alleviate this burden by providing expert contract review and negotiation support throughout the entire asset lifecycle – from acquisition to operation.”

One way digital infrastructure firms can reduce their financial risks is by incorporating so-called CRT, or contractual risk transfer, terms into their supplier agreements. For example, a data center operator could add a CRT provision to its power purchase contract with the local utility. The clause might specify that the utility must cover the costs of any data center downtime caused by power grid failures.

Marsh says that its Digital Infrastructure Contract Advisory Group can help clients negotiate favorable risk management terms with suppliers. “We ensure that contractual language aligns precisely with insurance obligations, helping to identify and close coverage gaps,” Mathews explained. “This not only safeguards our clients’ balance sheets but also unlocks capital and enables them to move swiftly in a fast-evolving industry.”

The newly formed unit carries out some of the tasks involved in the process with the help of custom software. “We are integrating internally developed advanced AI tools to enhance our contract review process,” Mathews said. “These tools assist with clause extraction, insurance requirement identification, and risk flagging, all while maintaining strict data security and manual validation to ensure accuracy.”

In addition to finding ways of reducing financial risks, Marsh can help clients buy insurance policies for the eventuality that those risks materialize. The firm ranks as the world’s largest insurance broker by revenue. According to Marsh, its Digital Infrastructure Contract Advisory Group can work with brokerage teams to put together policies for clients. The company offers an insurance facility called Nimbus that is geared specifically towards data center projects and provides limits of up to $2.7 billion. 

Data center photo courtesy of Unsplash