Equinix has unveiled plans for a fifth data centre in Singapore, as it looks to meet increasing demand for cloud services amidst accelerated digital transformation efforts. Slated to launch in the first half of 2021, the new site will boast an initial capacity of 1,300 cabinets and investment of $144 million in the first phase.
The data centre also will offer 18,400 square feet of colocation space and, at full capacity, is targeted to house 5,000 cabinets and a total colocation space of almost 129,000 square feet. To be called SG5, the new nine-storey building will be located in Tanjong Kling, formerly known as Data Centre Park, and will be directly linked to Equinix's four other sites via dark fibre links.
The announcement comes months after the data centre operator opened its fourth local facility[1] earlier this year, with an initial investment of $85.3 million. Equinix runs 46 data centres across Asia-Pacific, including Australia, Japan, China, and South Korea, and plans to open another two in Osaka and Perth. Worldwide, it operates more than 220 data centres.
The new site in Singapore would tap the country's digitalisation efforts, which had been fuelled by the government's smart nation drive, said Equinix's South Asia managing director Leong Yee May, in a post[2] Tuesday. Citing the vendor's market research, she noted that Singapore's interconnection bandwidth was projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 51% between 2019 and 2023.
Leong said: "The success of Singapore's digital society hinges on the adoption and development of innovative technologies, such as 5G, artificial intelligence[3], virtual reality, robotics, the Internet of things, and cybersecurity. Supporting data transmissions between distributed devices and cloud environments is only possible when underpinned by the