GOLDEN DIGITAL GATEWAY
Malaysia’ s Cyberjaya and Johor regions have attracted significant investment, along with Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam.
Batam offers advantages that distinguish it from other alternatives, though. The island sits approximately 20 kilometres south of Singapore with established ferry connections. More importantly, its Special Economic Zone designation provides tax advantages including zero import duties, valueadded tax exemptions and reduced corporate tax rates.
“ Our view is that it’ s not a question of if Batam will blossom, it’ s a question of when,” Nicholas says.
“ As a data centre customer today, it’ s very difficult to get capacity in Singapore, which is why customers will start to look at options beyond.”
Batam’ s submarine cable infrastructure includes 12 cables with direct links to Singapore, enabling sub-2 millisecond latency connections.“ We think Batam is very strategic, given it’ s got 12 submarine cables of its own, directly connecting with Singapore, and can offer less than 2ms of latency,” says Nicholas.“ Customers could potentially come here to Batam and then leverage that location and the strategic position of Singapore as one of the key data centre hubs in APAC.”
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