Search engine giant Google is looking to establish data hubs in Asia and has already set the wheels rolling by acquiring land in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore.
Taj Meadows, the company’s policy communications manager for Asia Pacific, said, “The data centers will be the first Google proprietary data centers in Asia and will be fully owned and operated by the company. Some of the key things we look for in a site include closeness to our users, robust infrastructure, reliable power, availability of skilled workers, reasonable business regulations and cost.”
Internet usage in Asia is on the rise as compared to any other part of the world, hence, locating data centers there makes sense and Google is of the opinion that local data centers will help provide faster and more reliable access to its services.
Google is not the only company which is seeking to establish local data centers in Asia. Owing to a surge in Internet usage in Asia, particularly for consumer applications, a number of multinational Internet and hosting companies have set up data centers to serve local customers and also to meet local government regulations in countries which require data to be handled locally, says Jun Fwu Chin, research manager for virtualization and data center at IDC Malaysia.
The advantage of setting up a data center in Asia is that the cost of setting up one is much lower than in the U.S., says Chin. To set up these centers, Google has obtained 2.45 hectares of land in Jurong West, Singapore, in Taiwan it acquired 15 hectares of land in Changhua county and in Hong Kong it acquired 2.7 hectares of land in Kowloon.
Google has 15 offices and thousands of employees across the Asia-Pacific region. However, Google is facing tough competition from local players in a number of local markets in Asia. In China, it trails Baidu, the largest Internet search company in the country. In Taiwan, according to web traffic monitoring service Alexa, and in Hong Kong, Google trails Yahoo and Facebook. The exception is Singapore, where Google is the leader.
It is expected that the extent of Google’s investment in Taiwan and Hong Kong would exceed US $ 100 million each, including the cost of land, construction and technical equipment. The amount of Google’s investment in Singapore has not been specified. The company has also not specified when construction would begin at these sites, however what it has confirmed is that once the construction work begins, the facilities would be operational within a year or two, considering there won’t be any major delays.