SINGAPORE (THE BUSINESS TIMES) - AirTrunk on Wednesday (Dec 9) opened its first Singapore data centre - located on 1.5ha of land in Loyang due to its close proximity to the Changi North Cable landing station, allowing for strong international connectivity, the company announced in a statement.

Named AirTrunk SGP1, the scalable data centre is "a key part of the company's growing Asia-Pacific platform", and will boast an overall capacity of more than 60 megawatts (MW) upon completion.

Currently in its first phase, the data centre has opened with a capacity of 30 MW. Construction for phase two is already under way "to cater for strong customer demand".

Focusing on sustainability and minimising carbon footprint, SGP1 is "designed with a range of innovations" to deliver a power usage effectiveness of 1.25, using 40 per cent less water than the industry average, said AirTrunk.

The Asia-Pacific hyperscale data centre specialist also noted that the facility - catered for hyperscale customers to aid their rapid growth in Singapore and throughout South-east Asia - is the most land-use efficient in the market, offering the highest information technology load per sq m.

AirTrunk founder and chief executive Robin Khuda said that the data centre is supporting some of the largest technology companies in the world.

"Hyperscale data centre demand in Singapore has been fuelled by increased cloud adoption in the region, further accelerated by Covid-19. Our customers continue to grow their digital footprint across the Asia-Pacific region and need the supporting critical infrastructure," he said.

StarHub, for instance, will be providing data centre services for its corporate customers from SGP1, playing a critical role in bringing enterprise customers into AirTrunk's cloud ecosystem.

AirTrunk said that to support the growing Singapore tech ecosystem, there needs to be sustainable growth of data centres.

Added Mr Khuda: "With data at the heart of Smart Nation, the launch of SGP1... will support Singapore's position as a key global data hub, attracting world-class innovation and the world's top technology companies."

On the same day, AirTrunk also opened its 20-plus MW Hong Kong facility, named AirTrunk HKG1. The Singapore and Hong Kong data centres are the newest additions to the company's portfolio, comprising facilities in Sydney West, Melbourne, and two others in Sydney North and Japan, which are currently under construction.