SHKP Quarterly

Raymond Tong: Data centres as the Internet’s ‘high speed rail stations’ 湯國江：數據中心如網絡世界的「高鐵站」 Entering the 5G era, new economy sectors have emerged, and data transmission is growing around the world. According to SUNeVision Executive Director & CEO Raymond Tong, demand for data centre services is increasing, as enterprises, cloud service providers, telcos and other companies need connectivity to transfer substantial volumes of data for their operations. “Our entire team and all our shareholders are very excited about and look forward to the future development of SUNeVision,” said Raymond. Carrier- and cloud-neutral positioning favoured by multinationals SUNeVision, Hong Kong’s largest data centre provider, is the technology arm of Sun Hung Kai Properties. With global top 10 connectivity, SUNeVision provides carrier- and cloud- neutral data centre services. By building an Asia's leading data centre ecosystem, it effectively connects telcos, cloud service providers, internet service providers and other companies across the city, Mainland China and the world, playing a crucial role in local and global data transmission. “There are now over 10 international submarine cable systems linked to Hong Kong, the majority of which are connected to MEGA-i, our data centre in Chai Wan and one of the leading data centres in Asia, serving as a connectivity hub. This exemplifies the trust multinational corporations put in SUNeVision, while recognizing our global market positioning,” he said. Raymond said that taking a position of ‘neutrality’ is the key to SUNeVision’s success: “When the company was set up in 2000, a sage decision was made to position it as a carrier- neutral data centre provider. Many local data centre providers were telco giants, which also laid submarine cables and provided bandwidth service. When seeking data centre services in Hong Kong to connect with other submarine cable systems, overseas enterprises, telcos and internet service providers in particular, prefer to opt for our data centres, which are carrier-neutral as we are not a competitor and do not limit customers to use specific service providers,” said Raymond. First-mover advantage Raymond believes that SUNeVision, a subsidiary of Sun Hung Kai Properties Group, has grown steadily thanks to the backing of SHKP. When the company was established 20 years ago, the Group’s management, with sharp insight, decided to convert selected industrial buildings into data centres, giving SUNeVision first-mover advantage in the market. “We are supported by the Group in project management, data centre design and development, and facility management, which helps us form a professional data centre operation team to provide customers with one-stop services,” he said. While new economy players are growing rapidly, demand for cloud services from traditional businesses is also rising. The local data centre market is expected to continue to expand. SUNeVision is the Hong Kong data centre leader, with a market share of nearly 20%, and currently boasts five data centres in Hong Kong, with close to 1.4 million square feet of gross floor area (GFA). To meet the market’s accelerating development in the long run, two new greenfield sites, namely TKOTL 131 in Tseung Kwan O and TWTL 428 in Tsuen Wan, were acquired in recent years and are expected to be completed in phases in 2022. The timely supply of the two new projects will add 1.4 million square feet of GFA to the company’s data centre portfolio, and thus doubling its overall space to 2.8 million square feet for future development. 新意網執行董事及行政總裁 SUNeVision Executive Director & CEO Raymond Tong 湯國江 24 Profile Vol 97 • Q3 2020 • SHKP Quarterly