Philippines may be next data centre hub: Globe Telecom CEO
GLOBE Telecom expects its biggest data centre to be operational in two years as the company capitalises on growing demand and customers wanting to hedge geopolitical risks, said president and chief executive officer Ernest Cu.
“We’re now in the throes of building a 124 MW facility with ST Telemedia here in the Philippines, and hopefully we’ll have it online early 2025,” Cu said in an interview on Monday (Sep 18) with Bloomberg Television. The facility in a Quezon City suburb comprises over 83,000 sq m of gross floor area across four buildings.
The new data centre highlights Globe’s ongoing shift from a telco into a technology firm, and as it looks for other ways to boost growth with the telecommunications and broadband businesses expected to plateau in the near term. To date, competitor PLDT has led the data centre race in the Philippines, with 10 data centres accounting for about two-thirds of the domestic industry’s power share.
Globe is looking at two more landing stations in the country to boost connectivity and data capacity in underserved areas.
“So with the added connectivity, with the added data centre capacity, we believe that the Philippines will become a great alternative for the many hyperscalers that have to serve in the region,” Cu said, referring to large cloud service providers that offer enterprise-scale computer and storage services. Capacity limitations in Singapore and geopolitical concerns in Hong Kong could prompt more locators to consider the Philippines, he added.
Singtel owns about 47 per cent of Globe Telecom’s common shares, while Philippine conglomerate Ayala Corp holds about 31 per cent, data compiled by Bloomberg indicated.
Globe has been betting on its mobile-wallet GCash to propel its growth. It may hold an initial public offering for GCash in one to two years, the Globe chief said. There is no rush for GCash to go public, as it can raise money from private sources, he added.
“There are lots of people knocking on our doors who want to get hold of some of the equity of GCash, given its growth potential and dominance in the country,” Cu said.
Globe Telecom shares climbed as much as 2.1 per cent in morning trade after closing 2.4 per cent lower last Friday. BLOOMBERG
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