Southeast Asia is racing to build the infrastructure powering the AI boom, but its hot, humid climate could be making that expansion more complicated. Data center demand in the region, where supply is up to 70% lower than in mature markets like the U.S. and China, is expected to grow by 20% each year through 2028, according to the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council. There are now 370 data centers in the region, with the majority in Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia.
“The ecosystem has realized that if they don’t latch on to this next wave, they might end up being digitally colonized,” Mayank Shrivastava, the CEO of Singapore-headquartered BDx Data Centers, told Fortune. “Economic gains flow to the country that converts raw material into finished goods–and, in this case, the raw material is data.”
