SuneVision goes where Google won't venture in Hong Kong
SuneVision is ploughing ahead with its datacenter facility estimated to cost at least HK$3.8 billion (US$490.12 million), seemingly unfazed by Google's recent decision to scrap its own plans in Hong Kong.
The 21st Century Data Center
The technology arm of Sun Hung Kai Properties, one of Hong Kong's largest property developers, SuneVision in October secured a site in Tseung Kwan O in a government tender, which potentially could span a gross floor area of over 473,600 square feet. It sits in the same vicinity as the land on which Google in 2011 had begun constructing its then-first Asian data center, originally slated to be operating in early-2013. Last week, the U.S. tech giant said it had abandoned its plans for a Hong Kong facility, which it had invested US$300 million to build, citing difficulties in acquiring land for expansion.
SuneVision, which already has data centers in four other locations in Hong Kong, seems more optimistic. The company's executive director and chief executive, Peter Yan King-shun, was cited in a report by South China Morning Post: "We are very positive on the market outlook for data centers."
Yan declined to reveal details of the company's investment in the Tseung Kwan O facility, but said it would sit at the low-end of market estimates. He revealed that at least 60 percent of the gross floor area would be operational in the first phase of launch, slated for end-2018.
The report quoted John Siu, managing director of international property consultant Cushman & Wakefield Hong Kong, who estimated SuneVision's data center could cost between HK$3.8 billion and HK$4.8 billion (US$490.12 million and US$619.1 million).
Despite Google's decision, Siu said there was growing demand for high-tier rack spaces among businesses in Hong Kong. He further called on the government to free up more land for data centers, noting that a multinational telecommunications company in 2010 had wanted 100,000 square feet of space to build a facility in Hong Kong. "But it was finally forced to move to Singapore partly because there was no available space here," Siu said.
While it abandoned its datacenter plans in Hong Kong, Google last week officially opened two others in Taiwan--its largest facility in the region spanning 15 hectares of land--and in Singapore.