The Asia Pacific (APAC) region experienced strong growth due mainly to new capacity announcements in Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, and Tokyo and market expansions in Mumbai, according to the recently released 2023 quarterly Knight Frank Data Centre report.
Total market capacity recorded in Q1 2023 across all nine markets is reported to be over 13,400MW. The markets include Shanghai, Tokyo, Mumbai, Sydney, Seoul, Singapore, Hong Kong, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur.
Kuala Lumpur stood out as the main catalyst for growth in the Southeast Asian market, with the supply expansion in Q1 2023 accounting for a significant one-third of the total supply added last year. Cloud service providers like Amazon Web Services have focused their investments in Kuala Lumpur, with plans to develop there in the current quarter.
The growth of Malaysia’s data center sector has predominantly occurred in two key areas, namely Greater Kuala Lumpur (which includes Central Kuala Lumpur and Cyberjaya) and Johor. In the past ten years, Malaysia has emerged as one of the most vibrant data center markets in the region, thanks to a surge in cloud adoption, government-supported initiatives, and the Singapore data center moratorium.
The Bangkok market grew by a third in supply since the end of 2022, as data center operators aim to increase their presence by expanding their capacities across different locations within the city.
In Q1 this year, Mumbai experienced the most significant capacity expansion, with a total market capacity of over 2,000MW, driven by announcements from established players and newcomers like Digital Edge.
Tokyo witnessed the addition of over 50MW of capacity in Q1, with considerable interest in Tier 1 market opportunities. The market activity was fueled by pipeline projects owned by operators such as ST Telemedia and STACK Infrastructure. In February 2023, AirTrunk held a groundbreaking ceremony for the next phase of development at its TOK2 hyperscale campus.
There are positive trends in both established and hypergrowth data center markets in the Asia Pacific region, continuing the upward momentum in market growth seen over the last four quarters.
