With "amount" will you use singular or plural?

I am confused about this grammatical question:

• large amount of data and the fact that it will exponentially grow
• large amount of data and the fact that they will exponentially grow

(the semantic is that the number of data will increase).

Which of the two forms is the correct one?

Solution 1:

In

...large amount of data and the fact that X will exponentially grow

what is X referring to? 'Amount' or 'data'?

X refers to 'amount' and IT will grow. (if you take away the prepositional phrase, nothing else whould change, 'the amount, it will grow'.

See what happens with

...large amount of apples and the fact that X will exponentially grow

If you said 'they will grow', you'd presumably be referring to the individual apples, but instead you are talking about the -amount- that will grow.

This is confusing because both 'amount' is a mass noun and 'data' is naturally taken to be a mass noun but pedantically is considered the plural of a count noun (with the rare 'datum' as the singular).

Solution 2:

Rewrite for less awkwardness, e.g.

The volume of data is already large and is set to grow exponentially.