How Is Asia Pacific Scaling Data Center Capacity Amid the AI Boom?

Asia Pacific is committing capital at a scale that rivals the US, but with a notably different emphasis: national industrial strategy, subsea connectivity, and licensing frameworks are moving in step with capacity growth, rather than trailing behind it.

South Korea Is Making the Region's Largest Single Bet

South Korea has announced a $919 billion investment plan across semiconductors, AI, and data centers, targeting 18.4 GW of data center capacity by 2035. The first phase alone will deliver 8.4 GW by 2029, led by SK Group, GS Group, and Naver, with construction beginning in the first half of 2028. This is not incremental growth. It is a deliberate, state-backed bid to position South Korea as a top-tier global AI infrastructure hub.

That ambition is being matched with connectivity investment. South Korea will build a landing station in the Saemangeum National Industrial Complex for the 8,900 km Asia United Gateway East subsea cable, linking South Korea with Singapore, Japan, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Taiwan by Q3 2029.

Singapore Is Choosing Regulation Over Restriction

Rather than pausing development, Singapore has proposed a Digital Infrastructure Bill introducing licensing requirements for data center operators and cloud providers generating over S$100 million in annual local revenue. The framework mandates cybersecurity, disaster recovery, and incident reporting standards, a model that prioritises resilience and governance over blanket moratoriums, and one worth watching as other APAC markets weigh their own regulatory response.

Malaysia and Indonesia Are Building Out Southeast Asia's Digital Backbone

AirTrunk has secured $2.3 billion in financing for its JHB2 campus in Johor Bahru, Malaysia, a 270 MW facility using liquid cooling technology. Johor's continued momentum reinforces its position as one of Southeast Asia's primary hyperscale corridors. In Indonesia, Telin, BW Digital, and Nongsa Digital Park have completed the landing of the 50 km Nongsa Changi Cable connecting Batam to Singapore, positioning Batam as an emerging regional data center hub with direct low-latency access to Singapore's ecosystem.

India, Nepal, and Australia Show the Breadth of the Region's Growth

Amazon continues to expand water sustainability projects across India, targeting more than 4 billion litres in annual replenishment as part of its 2027 water-positive commitment, a reminder that resource stewardship is becoming inseparable from data center expansion strategy across the region. In Nepal, DataHub's launch of YetiCloud.ai with Hosted AI marks one of the clearest examples yet of AI infrastructure reaching frontier and emerging markets, not just established hubs.

In Australia, Firmus has signed a 12-year, 600 MW energy supply agreement with Gunvor Group to support its Project Southgate AI campuses in South Australia, backed by 1.2 GW of new renewable generation and 1.5 GWh of battery storage by 2032. Across the Tasman, New Zealand's Green Party has called for a one-year moratorium on new AI data centers, citing the resource demands of projects such as Datagrid Southland, expected to consume around 6% of the country's total electricity supply. The proposal has not been enacted, but it signals that the region's regulatory conversation is far from settled.

What This Means for Employers and Candidates

APAC's growth is being underpinned by state-level industrial strategy, subsea connectivity, and proactive licensing regimes rather than reactive moratoriums. For employers, this creates sustained demand for talent spanning energy procurement, subsea and telecoms infrastructure, regulatory compliance, and sustainability engineering, across both established hubs and fast-emerging markets.

Source: EIC Newsbrief – Data Center, July 2026