Ayala putting up $1 billion data center, biggest in Philippines

MANILA, Philippines — The Ayala Group and its Singaporean partner are investing at least $1 billion to build the largest data center in the Philippines as they prepare for the entry of tech giants locating here.

ST Telemedia Global Data Centers (STT GDC) Philippines will spend about $1 billion to put up STT Fairview, a 124-megawatt data center in Quezon City, to support the country in its pursuit to become a hyperscale hub.

STT GDC Philippines president Carlo Malana said STT Fairview would start running by 2025 with an initial capacity of 28 MW that can be scaled up depending on incoming demand.

In particular, STT Fairview will comprise four buildings occupying around 83,000 square meters of land, located in an area with nearby infrastructure for logistics, telco, and transport. Once finished, the facility can cater to the needs of both enterprises and hyperscalers.

Hyperscalers refer to tech giants like Amazon, Google and Meta that are always on the lookout for co-location spaces like STT Fairview where they can store their data. As such, the Philippines can attract hyperscalers to invest in the country through its data centers.

Malana said STT GDC plans to mix up its financing sources in completing STT Fairview given that the project requires $1 billion in investment.

On the other hand, Department of Information and Communications Technlogy (DICT) Secretary Ivan John Uy said the hyperscale market is expected to become one of the strongest revenue generators of the economy in the future.

Based on estimates, the data center industry in the country will grow by an average of 25 percent every year until 2027, providing a boost not only to the economy, but also to employment.

According to think tank Oxford Economics, a 20-MW data center bolsters the economy by up to $5.3 billion and creates over 28,000 jobs. With this, Uy said DICT is educating students on data center management to supply the manpower for future investors.

“This is an open green field where they [investors] can see almost unlimited growth, not just the untouched potential of our land and resources, but also our human resources. That’s why even as early as now the DICT is already reskilling many of our youth in data center management, which is going to be one of the important future jobs for our youth sector,” Uy told reporters.

Last year Ayala-led Globe Telecom Inc. signed a $350 million agreement with Singapore-based STT GDC to develop and operate data centers in the Philippines.

To date, STT GDC Philippines–a joint venture between Ayala Corp., Globe and STT GDC–runs five data centers in Metro Manila with a total capacity of 22 MW.