NASDAQ-listed Equinix plans to build a fourth data centre in Singapore at an initial cost of US$85.3 million.

The seven-storey facility in Tai Seng Industrial Estate, called SG4, is expected to open in the fourth quarter of this year.

The first phase of SG4 will provide more than 45,400 square feet (approximately 4,220 square metres) of co-location space, offering an initial capacity of 1,400 cabinets, the interconnection and data centre company said in a media statement on Tuesday.

When capacity is ramped to its fullest, the data centre can provide more than 4,000 cabinets with a total co-location space of more than 132,180 sq ft (approximately 12,280 sq metres).

The facility, to be directly connected to the three existing Equinix data centres in Singapore via low-latency dark fiber links, will enable customers to securely interconnect with approximately 600 companies from different industries, including financial services, cloud services, biomedical sciences, IT, communications, media, physical sciences and engineering.

It will also provide software-defined interconnection to more than 1,300 businesses including some of the largest cloud service providers such as Alibaba Cloud, Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform, Microsoft Azure, Oracle Cloud and Tencent Cloud. Customers can find and connect to the aggregation of companies and ecosystems at Equinix on demand, locally or in other metro areas. This includes on-demand global connectivity to customers who are on Equinix's platforms.

President of Equinix Asia-Pacific, Samuel Lee, said: "At the heart of digital business in Asia-Pacific, Singapore is a crucial hub for many organisations in the region, generating skyrocketing demand for cloud and interconnection services. With interconnection accelerating across the Asia-Pacific region, the new SG4 IBX data centre will create more opportunities for businesses, both locally and regionally, to interconnect with their customers, partners and stakeholders to achieve digital success, further enhancing the digital economies across Singapore and the region."

According to a market study published by Equinix, Singapore's interconnection bandwidth capacity - a measurement of direct and private data exchange between businesses - is expected to more than quadruple by 2021, reaching 394 terabytes per second at a compound annual growth rate of 47 per cent.

Currently, Equinix has 200 data centres across 52 markets and 24 countries, providing services for more than 9,800 businesses. In Asia-Pacific, Equinix has 40 data centres across key cities in countries including Australia, China, Indonesia, Japan and Singapore.