NextDC, an Australian data center operator, is planning phased development of two new data centers in Auckland, New Zealand and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to accelerate its expansion plans and to cater to growing demand for data center services across the Asia-Pacific region.
According to Craig Scroggie, New Zealand and Malaysia are just the first greenfield geographic expansion opportunities outside of Australia, and they are excited about the possibilities ahead.
NextDC is targeting construction at both regions to begin in 2024, and aiming to complete in the first half of 2026.
According to Arizton, New Zealand Data Center Market size was valued at $672 million in 2021 and is expected to reach $1.87 billion by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 18.65 during 2022-2027.
Consequently, in the Q1 of 2023, various players have entered the market and some of them announced their expansions particularly in Auckland. In February, Akamai Technologies, an American content delivery network (CDN), is constructing a scrubbing center and cloud data center in Auckland as part of its global investment strategy.
In April, Spark gears up to supersize its Takanini data center and in the same month, DCI Data Centres (DCI) has announced the completion of the first of two new generation cloud data centers in Auckland as it continues its expansion across New Zealand.
Meanwhile, in Malaysia, the data center market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 9.41% during the 2022-2028 period, according to Arizton’s research. Thus, some data center players have also announced their plans to develop data centers in the country.
Earlier this year, AirTrunk announced its entry into the country with plans to develop a 150+MW data center which will be the company’s first in Malaysia and ninth in APJ, taking its data center platform to over 1.35GW of capacity.
Additionally, Gaw Capital Partners and A3 Capital formed a joint venture platform with the launch of the first Infinaxis data center in the country.
Last month, some players also invested in the country. MN Holdings Bhd partnered with China’s Shanghai DC-Science Co Ltd to work together on building a high performance data center in Malaysia with the project being valued at an estimated US$600m. DigitalBridge Group also invested multi billion ringgit in data center investment in the country.
Recently this month, AIMS Group announced the construction of AIMS Cyberjaya Block 2 and Acronis has opened its first cyber cloud data center in Kuala Lumpur to meet the overwhelming demand for data center space in Malaysia.
With the number of players entering the New Zealand and Malaysia data center market, it is anticipated that the aforementioned will become a major Asian hub for data centers, particularly Malaysia which has come out on top as the most desired destination for data center investment.
