Global colocation and interconnection provider Equinix has signed an agreement to form a $525 million joint venture with GIC, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund. Together, the companies plan to develop and operate two xScale data centers in Seoul, Korea.
According to the terms of Equinix’s joint venture agreement with GIC, GIC will possess an 80 percent ownership interest in the joint venture, with Equinix owning the remaining 20 percent. The joint venture is planned to conclude in the first quarter of 2022, subject to regulatory clearance and other closing circumstances.
The two joint venture data center facilities in Seoul, dubbed SL2x and SL3x, are planned to supply more than 45 megawatts (MW) of power capacity to meet the unique core workload deployment demands of hyperscale organizations, including the world’s leading cloud service providers (CSPs).
When finished and completely developed, this new joint venture will raise the worldwide xScale data center portfolio to more than $8 billion over 36 sites, with an estimated power capacity of more than 720MW.
Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC and Equinix have agreed to invest billions of dollars in total in 2020 and 2021, to create a portfolio of hyperscale data centers in response to increased demand from CSPs.
“More and more organizations are embracing a digital-first strategy to scale their operations, enhance the experiences of their customers, and unlock the value of technologies like 5G, IoT, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML),” said Charles Meyers, President and CEO at Equinix. “Korea and the broader Asia-Pacific market are both enablers and beneficiaries as organizations prioritize digital transformation. To address demand for cloud and digital infrastructure, we have continued to invest in the region through the expansion of International Business Exchange capacity and locations, as well as the expansion of our hyperscale program, xScale, in Australia, and now Korea.”
xScale Data Centers in Korea
With more hyperscale providers emerging in Korea to meet businesses’ digital infrastructure demands, the country’s cloud computing sector is likely to thrive. According to IDC Korea’s latest study ‘Korea Cloud IT Infrastructure Market Forecast, 2021,’ the Cloud IT infrastructure market in Korea is predicted to develop at a CAGR of 15% over the following five years, reaching roughly $1.86 billion (2.2189 trillion won) in sales by 2025.
The establishment of xScale data centers in Korea will enable hyperscale providers to add core deployments to their existing Equinix access point footprints, allowing them to grow on a single platform that can immediately span 65 global metros and offer direct interconnection to their customers and strategic business partners.
Equinix launched their first IBX, SL1, in the Korean market in 2019. Clients may link their corporate IT infrastructure to global hyperscale providers such as Alibaba Cloud, AWS, Google Cloud Platform, Microsoft Azure, and Oracle Cloud at the facility using Equinix Fabric for a high-performance solution and increased user experience. With this xScale expansion, these hyperscale providers may continue to develop at Equinix, close to an ecosystem of more than 10,000 clients on its expanding infrastructure of more than 235 data centers worldwide.
