Equinix, Inc. has announced its plans to expand the company’s footprint in Singapore and the Asia-Pacific region with development of a third International Business Exchange™ (IBX®) and expansion of its second data center. The expansion plan showcases Equinix’s success in addressing market demand from financial and cloud service providers and demonstrates the company’s ongoing commitment to the data center market in Singapore.

“Singapore is currently one of the fastest growing cloud adopters in Asia-Pacific, fueled by the rapid growth in adoption of social networking as well as the consumption of new forms of digital content. As a result, organizations including financial institutions here require an efficient, reliable and secure data center to support the growing number of digital platforms they use to serve their customers. We recognize the increasing demand for cloud and interconnection services as well as changing security requirements from both local and multinational organizations in Singapore. Our expansion is well-timed to meet strong market demand and will provide customers the ability to connect to an established ecosystem of existing and potential customers and partners,” said Samuel Lee, president, Equinix Asia Pacific.

At a groundbreaking ceremony that was held this morning, Equinix announced that it has commissioned Mapletree Industrial Trust, a leading industrial real estate investment trust listed in Singapore, to develop the new Singapore IBX, known as SG3.

“We are pleased to embark on the development of SG3 as Equinix expands its presence in Singapore. We will build SG3 to meet BCA Green Mark and Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards to underscore our commitment to environmentally sustainable developments .The partnership with Equinix also establishes Mapletree Industrial Trust as the preferred real estate partner for companies requiring high specification industrial facilities. We congratulate Equinix on this milestone event,” said Tham Kuo Wei, chief executive officer, Mapletree Industrial Trust Management, the manager of Mapletree Industrial Trust.

Scheduled to open in the second half of 2014, SG3 will further extend Platform Equinix™ to meet strong demand for premium interconnection and data center services in Singapore from financial and cloud companies. SG3 will provide approximately 385,000 square feet of gross floor area and 5,000 cabinets over multiple phases. With a proposed investment of US$50 – US$55M¹, the first phase will provide 1,000 cabinets.

At the same time, Equinix is investing US$55M in the fifth phase of its second Singapore IBX data center. The fifth phase of the expansion, which is expected to be available end of 2013, will provide 920 additional cabinets, bringing the total number of cabinets at this IBX data center to 4,176. It will also enable the provision of a high-connectivity, high-availability environment to support its customers’ cloud-based services.

SG3 will be located in close proximity to Equinix’s existing SG1 data center, which is located at one-north, a 200-hectare development by JTC Corporation designed to host a cluster of world-class research facilities and business park space to support growth in the biomedical sciences, infocomm technology, media, physical sciences and engineering industries.

SG3 and SG1 data centers will be interconnected through a dedicated fiber network, allowing customers in SG1 to expand their business within the Equinix platform. Direct tethering to SG1, which is the most network-dense data center in the country, enables customers in SG3 to interconnect as if they were in the same location.

Recognizing financial customers’ need for network-rich infrastructure with robust security, scalable, low-cost and low-latency connectivity, SG3 will be compliant with guidelines introduced by the Monetary Authority of Singapore in July 2012.

SG3 will also feature Business Suites for existing and new customers in Singapore who require larger footprints. With Business Suites, Equinix can offer customers bespoke solutions and an option to tie their larger deployments for select applications into Platform Equinix without sacrificing reliability or access to carriers and the Equinix ecosystem.

As the Singapore government continues to raise the bar in data center quality through eco-friendly initiatives that encourage the construction of green and modular facilities, Equinix has also pledged itself to driving sustainable technologies. In an effort to minimize energy consumption at these energy-intensive facilities, both SG2 and SG3 are designed with the aim of operating as energy-efficiently as possible.

Some of the green features deployed at SG3 ― which are already implemented at SG2 ― include motion-activated LED lights, electrically commutated fans, an automated system that reduces a motor’s speed and power, as well as a cold aisle containment infrastructure that supports higher power density installations for more efficient cooling. Recycled NEWater is also used for cooling purposes, an energy-saving process that is aligned with the Singapore Government’s green initiatives. Additionally, a solar power system will be implemented, a feature unique to SG3.

For its exemplary green initiatives, SG2 was recently presented with the Gold Plus award under the BCA-IDA Green Mark for Data Centers scheme. The first of its kind in Asia, the scheme assesses data centers in Singapore based on five key criteria ― energy efficiency, water efficiency, sustainable construction & management, indoor environment quality as well as other green features.

¹ Indicative number