Malaysia is witnessing considerable growth in data center capacity plant-up, and the country is predicted to see an increase in investments with over 800-megawatt (MW) capacity over the next five years due to lower land and energy costs. The country has emerged as an attractive location for data center investments, thanks to abundant land and power resources, good international connectivity and supportive government policies.
A report by Arizton Advisory and Intelligence projects Malaysia’s data center market to grow at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7% to USD 1.6 billion in 2027 from USD 1.1 billion in 2021. This growth will be fueled by rapid hyperscale investments and strong co-location demand.
Malaysia already hosts over 40 enterprise data centers, such as AIMS Data Centre Sdn Bhd, Bridge Data Centres (M) Sdn Bhd, GDS Services Ltd, Keppel Data Centres Holdings Pte Ltd and TM ONE/VADS Bhd.
The development of the sector is overseen by the Malaysia Digital Economy Corp (MDEC), an agency tasked with advancing the nation’s ICT and digital economy. Together with the Malaysian Investment Development Authority (MIDA) and the Performance Management and Delivery Unit (Pemandu), they form the data center task force (DCTF) responsible for facilitating data center investments in the country.
Recently, Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced a USD 6 billion investment to set up a cloud region in Malaysia to meet the strong demand for cloud services in the country and in the ASEAN region. Back in 2019, Microsoft established its first data center region in Malaysia with USD 1 billion invested over five years.
(Source: The Malaysian Reserve)
