Goodman Completes 50MW, GDS-Leased Data Centre in Hong Kong

Goodman Group has completed a 50-megawatt data centre in Hong Kong’s Tsuen Wan West area, as the Aussie industrial specialist forges forward with a transformation that has digital infrastructure projects now accounting for 40 percent of its development pipeline.

The facility, which has been handed over to the international unit of Shanghai-based data centre developer and operator GDS Holdings, is the third building in the Goodman Tsuen Wan West data centre campus, with Goodman also expecting to complete a fourth property on the site by the end of this year, with that project also leased to GDS.

“This is the latest data centre completion at the brand new 225MW Goodman Tsuen Wan West campus, further demonstrating our ability to provide the essential infrastructure needed to support Hong Kong’s digital economy,” Paul McGarry, Goodman’s head of Asia said in a release on Wednesday. “This handover at Goodman Tsuen Wan West to GDS continues our track record of successfully delivering complex large-scale projects, in major global cities, helping improve speed to market for our customers.”

GDS’s leasing of Goodman’s facilities comes as the mainland data centre operator works to raise $600 million to $800 million in fresh financing to fund the continued expansion of GDS International, the unit which oversees the firm’s business outside of mainland China.

Growing Data Centre Exposure

The facility at 8-14 Sha Tsui Road is part of the Goodman Tsuen Wan West data centre campus which the company has been developing on the site of an old textiles factory it purchased for HK$1 billion in 2014. With the first two buildings in the project having been completed in 2022, the LEED-Gold pre-certified third phase of the project marks Goodman’s sixth data centre in Hong Kong.

Sydney-based Goodman managed 500MW of stabilised digital infrastructure globally as of 30 June, with another 400MW in progress. The company has also procured power for another 2.5GW of capacity and points to a potential capacity of 5.0GW including planned projects. Japan and Hong Kong respectively accounted for 1.3GW and 0.5GW of the portfolio, including planned projects, with the remainder spread across Australia, New Zealand, Europe and the US.

The company has identified data centres as a major area of growth and anticipates a “substantial” number of new projects to commence in the current fiscal year. Goodman is also reviewing numerous properties across its existing industrial portfolio for conversion to data centres.

Also in Tsuen Wan, Goodman is currently redeveloping the Goodman Texaco Centre industrial building at 126-140 Texaco Road into a 32MW data centre which it expects to complete in mid-2026.

In January, Goodman announced the commencement of site preparation and infrastructure work for a 1,000MW hyperscale campus in Tsukuba to the northeast of Japan’s capital. The campus’s first data centre, a 50MW facility built for a client, is due for completion in 2026.

The company also announced in January the opening of a regional office in Singapore to support the firm’s data centre strategy in the region.

GDS Expands Internationally

With the handover, NASDAQ- and HKEX-listed GDS has commenced mechanical, electrical and plumbing construction on the facility dubbed HK3. The project is the company’s third data centre in Hong Kong alongside a pair of self-developed facilities with a total capacity of 34MW.

“This facility underscores our dedication to innovation and sustainability, while addressing the growing demand for data centre services driven by advancements in cloud computing and AI,” said Jamie Khoo, CEO of GDS International. “Positioned close to GDS HK1 and HK2, HK3 will form a powerful data centre cluster, offering expanded capacity to meet our customers’ evolving needs. We are confident this development will further strengthen our position in Hong Kong’s dynamic market.”

GDS disclosed on its second quarter earnings call that it has started Series B fundraising for GDS International and expects to complete the offering before the end of the year. Also known as DigitalLand Holdings, GDS International oversees the company’s operations in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, and Japan.

The new funding round comes after GDS International in the second quarter closed on $672 million of Series A funding from a consortium of investors including Chinese private equity major Hillhouse and its real assets arm Rava Partners, Boyu Capital, Princeville Capital, and Tekne Capital, with the capital raised amounting to a stake of about 47.3 percent for the investors. The fundraise was first announced in March with an initial target of $587 million.

GDS, which is also backed by Singaporean data centre provider STT GDC, entered Japan in April through a partnership with Hong Kong-based private equity firm Gaw Capital to build a 40MW data centre campus in western Tokyo.