The PLDT Group is planning to build a 13th data center facility amid an increasing demand from enterprise clients and hyperscalers.
Victor Genuino, president and CEO of the group’s information and communications technology (ICT) arm ePLDT, said in a recent event in Pasay they were “thinking” of putting up another data hub for critical servers and applications after having just announced plans for a 12th facility.
“We will continue to build more to be able to cater to the needs of the enterprises and government alike,” he said. Another segment that has been driving demand is the hyperscalers, or entities providing cloud, networking and internet services such as Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google GCP, Alibaba AliCloud, IBM and Oracle.
The company won’t share more details about the next project.
The 12th data center, which will be PLDT’s biggest yet with at least 100 megawatts (MW) in capacity, is set to start construction in 2026.
Genuino said they were looking at placing the hub in the Greater Manila Area.
ePLDT is targeting to finish its 11th data center, the VITRO Sta. Rosa in Laguna, by the second quarter of next year. It is designed with a 50-MW capacity.The telco giant recently announced that Eastern Communications acquired colocation slots in the Laguna data center to house its servers.
Demand in data center capacity is projected to rise further given companies’ shift to cloud technology, which supports various digital solutions including hybrid work setup.
The country has been seeing a surge in data center investments and prospects apart from PLDT.
Internet service provider Converge ICT Solutions Inc. shared in August it was spending at least $60 million to put up data centers each in Pampanga, Quezon City and Cebu. Globe Telecom Inc., meanwhile, recently broke ground for a data hub in Fairview, Quezon City.
“PLDT … acknowledges the need for more computing power, faster hyperconnectivity and massive digital infrastructure to support the future that lies around the corner,” Genuino said. INQ