he drive through Kulai, in Malaysia’s state of Johor, 30 kilometers from Singapore’s northern border, swoops through rolling green hills dotted with palm oil and rubber plantations. It’s here, nestled alongside the country’s old economic engines, that utilities-to-cement giant YTL is embarking on its most ambitious project yet to future-proof the family-controlled company: a massive 664-hectare site for a solar-powered data center park.
“The only certainties are death and taxes … and [now] probably death, taxes and the need for more computing power,” says Sydney-based Gartner research vice president Michael Warrilow. “Malaysia is just getting the cloud providers and that is part of what starts the gold rush,” he adds, noting that enterprises are increasingly moving to cloud providers, or renting versus owning data centers. “So that’s the underlying business opportunity for YTL.
Yeoh isn’t too concerned about the early-movers. The way he sees it, entering the market at this stage is well-timed, plus it has given YTL the opportunity to anchor from the outset the business on renewable energy, which could put it well ahead of the pack as companies pursue net zero carbon emission policies in the coming decades. “Our data centers are coming up just on time,” the sixty-eight-year-old says, recounting a costly lesson of being too early with new technology.
Among those pivoting to renewable energy is DCI and its partner, Jakarta-based Salim group. In June they unveiled Indonesia’s first solar-powered data center in Kara-wang, on the island of Java, situated on a 30-hectare section of a larger campus that can be expanded to 600MW at full capacity; currently the total electrical capacity generated by solar power can reach 30MW.
YTL draws the bulk of its revenues from its utilities, cement and construction businesses. These include YTL Power Seraya , a 3.1GW power plant facility on Jurong Island, Singapore, and Wessex Water Services , a water and sewage provider in the U.K.ata centers are part of a larger diversification push at YTL. The group has made plans to roll out services like electric vehicle-charging kiosks in Singapore.