PLDT plans to outdo rivals with 100-MW data hub, biggest in PH yet

PLDT Inc. is building a 100-megawatt data center estate in the province of Laguna, south of Metro Manila, marking its largest expansion to date given explosive demand for internet and cloud services.

PLDT said the “series of facilities” would rise on a five-hectare property in Sta. Rosa, which was selected for certain geographic advantages against natural disasters and easy access to urban areas and major highways.

PLDT president and CEO Alfredo S. Panlilio said the company needed to expand capacity because “demand for digital just keeps growing.”

“We have the ready facilities and we continue to expand our data centers to accommodate that demand to ensure that we are able to keep up and deliver future requirements,” he said in a statement on Tuesday.

Data centers provide critical data storage and information technology services to businesses. They are also notoriously power-intensive facilities, with capacity and efficiency measured by megawatts instead of land area.

PLDT’s 100-MW project would exceed all data center capacity in the Philippines, which was currently estimated by real estate consultancy firm Santos Knight Frank at 94 MW.

It would also dwarf the combined 48-MW capacity of PLDT subsidiary ePLDT’s 10 existing data centers.

PLDT said the new Sta. Rosa facility would be designed with sustainable energy features and would use renewable power sources to reduce carbon footprint.

Hyperscaler era

PLDT is positioning its business for the hyperscaler era or the expansion of technology giants such as Google and Facebook, whose massive capacity requirements are fueling the need for even larger data center facilities.

“This underscores the group’s commitment to accelerating the country’s competitive standing as the ideal digital hub in Asia-Pacific for global hyperscalers expanding in the region,” PLDT said in the statement.

PLDT competitors Globe Telecom, Converge ICT Solutions and DITO Telecommunity are currently expanding their data center services. Independent operators and international players are also rolling out their own data center expansion plans.

Alibaba Cloud, owned by Chinese billionaire Jack Ma, announced it would build its first data center in the Philippines while Singapore’s SpaceDC said it would put up a $700-million data center campus in Cainta, Rizal.

Last week, Beeinfotech PH announced the opening of a $100-million data center in Pasig City, Metro Manila. INQ