Network of regional data centres to contribute up to S$200M in annual revenue by 2005

Singapore, 17 April 2002 – Singapore Telecommunications Limited (SingTel) will complete its roll out of regional data centres in Asia Pacific when it launches SingTel SXPAN, its suite of Managed Hosting Services (MHS) in Sydney, Australia next month.  This will make SingTel the region’s leading player in the MHS market with a total space of 380,000 square feet spread over 10 data centres in six countries.  

The SXPAN network is the most extensive in Asia, comprising data centres located in Singapore (three), Hong Kong (two), Japan (two), Korea, Taiwan and Australia.   These data centres are linked via SingTel’s pan-Asian submarine cable systems, which include the C2C cable network.  SXPAN is also available in other markets like China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand through marketing alliances with local partners.

SXPAN enables multinational corporations and those in Internet-related business in the Asia Pacific region to outsource the operations of their communications network, IT systems and web hosting needs to SingTel in an off-site data centre.  Demand for hosting services is expected to grow rapidly with estimates of as many as 70 per cent of multinationals in the region outsourcing either all or some of their IT and communications requirements to a third party by 2003.  

Ms Mary Ong, SingTel’s CEO of MHS, said: “The regional market for hosting services is worth about S$1.1 billion today, growing to about S$2.5 billion by 2005.  We have set ourselves a target of eight per cent market share or an annual revenue of about S$200 million in three years’ time.”  SingTel expects about two-thirds of this revenue to come from Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong and Australia. 

In Singapore, more than 65 per cent of SingTel’s 300,000 square feet of data centre space has been leased.  Customers include government departments, financial institutions such as Citibank and Visa, technology companies such as Microsoft and portals like Asiaone.com, Lycos and Global Sources.

“Our experience and expertise as a telecommunications company differentiate us from other players in the market,” said Ms Ong.  “SingTel has been helping multinationals manage their communications and co-location requirements since the early 1990s.  Unlike other players, we do not see ourselves as just a provider of space.   We have end-to-end capabilities to allow companies to outsource all their network and IT operations.  This includes our ability to provide a full range of telco-grade services, easy access to bandwidth, and a comprehensive range of IT support services.  Our customers can scale up their operations as and when needed.   We are also the only Asia Pacific telco which can offer this service over multi-sites under a single contract and with a service level agreement.” 

SingTel has also leveraged the technology of the best players in the market to support the provision of services at its data centres, including leading IT vendors like BMC Software, Cisco Systems, EMC Corporation and Hewlett-Packard (HP).   These partners bring with them knowledge of systems and processes in operating world-class data centres. 

SingTel is the first in the region to partner HP under the latter’s Service Provider Programme.  Under this partnership, HP is committed to help build and operate data centres and transfer its skills and experience in managing data centres to SingTel.  This includes the provision of training and joint marketing efforts. 

SingTel’s data centres have been certified by HP to meet stringent standards in provisioning and supporting managed IT services.  SingTel’s storage management operations have also been certified by EMC to have the capability to support customers’ requirements ranging from online storage to offsite storage and backup services, including data recovery services to support business continuity. The SXPAN data centres are also in the process of obtaining BS7799 certification, an internationally recognised information security accreditation.

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