SINGAPORE government agencies have awarded around 80 MW of new capacity to four data centre operators through a pilot exercise that aims to enable the sustainable growth of data centres.

The Economic Development Board (EDB) and the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) on Friday (Jul 14) said that the four operators are Equinix, GDS, Microsoft, and an AirTrunk-ByteDance consortium.

They were selected through the pilot “Data Centre – Call for Application” (DC-CFA) exercise, which received more than 20 proposals. The agencies said the winning proposals were those that were “best able to meet our desired outcomes holistically, and had significantly competitive propositions to strengthen Singapore’s position as a regional hub”, as well as “contribute to broader economic objectives”.

Highlights from the proposals include the ability to deliver “best-in-class energy-efficient performance” through the comprehensive adoption of liquid cooling and energy-efficient core-IT equipment; and the significant expansion of “international connectivity, including through facilitating an increase in submarine cable capacity”.

The DC-CFA was launched to facilitate the sustainable building of new data centre capacity, after a pause in the growth of data centres was lifted last year.

Given the significant interest, EDB and IMDA said they will continue to engage industry stakeholders on future data centres.

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“We aim to allocate more capacity in the next 12 to 18 months to advance our interest as an innovative, sustainable, global digital hub,” the agencies said.

“With rapid advancements in generative artificial intelligence (AI), EDB and IMDA will also engage industry stakeholders in the immediate term on the compute and connectivity infrastructure required to build a competitive AI ecosystem.”