Renowned Mainland Data Centre Operator Drives Digital Economy

GDS Services expands its Hong Kong operation by building a premier data centre cluster in the city.

Founded in 2001, the Nasdaq and Hong Kong-listed GDS Services (GDS) is a leading developer and operator of high-performance data centres in Mainland China. The company’s facilities are strategically located in the Mainland’s primary economic hubs, where demand for top-notch data centre services is concentrated. It also supports build-to-suit developments and operates data centres at lower-tier locations to cater to specific business needs of its clients.

Over the past two decades, GDS has built over 85 data centres across Mainland China, serving nearly 820 clients such as hyper-scale cloud service providers, large internet companies, financial institutions, and telecommunications carriers. In 2013, the company extended its services to Hong Kong. In view of the booming information and communications technology (ICT) market, GDS plans to accelerate business growth by establishing a data centre cluster in Hong Kong and leveraging the city to tap into the global market, while simultaneously expanding its presence in the Southeast Asia region.

Making Hong Kong the Gateway to Global Expansion

According to William Huang, Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of GDS Services, the company established the Hong Kong Operation Centre in 2013 as part of its service network expansion in the Asia-Pacific region.

Huang said, “Over the years, we have seen a growing demand from our customers in the Mainland financial institutions looking to strengthen their offshore holdings, often by establishing a presence in Hong Kong. As a customer-centric company, we see it as our responsibility to follow our customers wherever they go, whether they are companies expanding into the Mainland China or outward across Southeast Asia. In order to meet the changing needs of our customers, such as those from hyper-scale cloud services and large internet companies, we will continue expanding our business and providing consistent, high-quality data centre services that are unmatched in the market.” He added that Mainland companies so often choosing Hong Kong as a key destination for expanding, largely due to its unique geographic location, has significantly expedited GDS’ global development opportunities.

Tapping into the Digital Transformation Momentum in the Region

GDS is committed to using its technological capabilities to empower the global innovative development of its clients. “In 2022, we established HK1, a Hong Kong-based, 22-storey data centre, which is our first self-developed data centre outside Mainland China and a pioneering core multi-cloud, cloud-neutral, and hybrid cloud exchange node of the Asia-Pacific region. Our state-of-the-art data centre development in Hong Kong serves as a springboard for Mainland enterprises looking to go global and foreign companies wishing to explore the Mainland Chinese market.”

Huang also noted that the Hong Kong government’s commitment to driving digital economy and more tech companies looking for reliable colocation data centre services provide substantial growth opportunities for GDS. “A data centre is a vital asset for the digital economy, as daily operations need to rely heavily on data centres to store, communicate, and transfer data without delay. To seize business opportunities, we are developing HK2, aiming to construct a GDS data centre cluster in Kwai Tsing district. With HK2 coming into operation in 2024, we will assist in facilitating Hong Kong’s digital transformation and the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) development, driving global high-speed interconnectivity as a whole,” Huang said, adding that the development of HK3 and HK4 are in the pipeline.

With sustainability becoming a core parameter for data centres, GDS spares no effort to explore cutting-edge green technologies and implements a variety of sustainable measures. “We adopt a sustainable approach to construct our data centres, increasing the use of renewable and green electricity while improving the energy utilisation rate. We aspire to make GBA a pioneer in the development of a greener digital economy,” Huang concluded.