ST TELEMEDIA Global Data Centres (STT GDC) Philippines is confident about the continued growth of data centers in the country as more businesses transition to cloud-first policies, according to its chief executive officer (CEO).
“In the Philippines, data center customers are predominantly still in the financial services sector, telecommunications, information systems-intensive applications, and the hyperscalers,” STT GDC Philippines President and CEO Carlomagno E. Malana said during the company’s “Practical Insights” event on Thursday.
“When you look at these enterprises and organizations, they all have a cloud-first policy now because it’s the most efficient way to harness, compute, and store resources,” he added.
A 2023 survey commissioned by Alibaba Cloud showed that approximately 85% of businesses in the Philippines are expected to transition to the cloud by the end of the year.
The rise in cloud adoption, coupled with the increasing use of agentic artificial intelligence, is driving the growth of data centers as companies continue to expand their IT infrastructure.
Mr. Malana also highlighted the opportunity for the Philippines to capture demand for data centers, citing the land and power constraints in more established markets like Singapore.
“Singapore is a city with a very small land footprint, so they have a problem with space and power allocation,” Mr. Malana said.
“Essentially, that’s caused other countries to become more viable for data centers, like Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines.”
Currently, the Philippines has a total data center capacity of 215 megawatts (MW), with 1,505 MW in the pipeline, according to Leechiu Property Consultants.
STT GDC Philippines, a joint venture between Globe Telecom, Inc., Ayala Corp., and ST Telemedia Global Data Centres, operates seven data centers in the country with a combined IT load of 150 MW.
The company expects to complete two new data centers — the 124-MW STT Fairview and 6-MW STT Cavite 2 — this year, with a combined investment of up to $1.56 billion.
“Data center costs are calculated by dollars per megawatt. The usual figure you hear ranges from somewhere around $11 to $12 million per megawatt — it can be a little bit less or more,” Mr. Malana said.
STT GDC is also working on completing the design for phase two of the STT Fairview data center by the end of this year. The Quezon City-based facility will be developed in four phases. — Beatriz Marie D. Cruz
