US REIT Equinix, Inc. (Nasdaq: EQIX) has opened a US$55 million International Business Exchange (IBX) data centre in Osaka, Japan, dubbed OS3.

The facility has been designed to serve enterprises in the Kansai region, which consists of major cities including Osaka, Kyoto and Kobe.

Scheduled to be brought online by the end of 2021, the OS3 data centre will provide an initial capacity of 900 cabinets and more than 33,000 square feet (approximately 3,070 square meters) of colocation space.

At full buildout, the facility will provide 2,500 cabinets with a total colocation space of approximately 89,340 square feet (more than 8,300 square meters). 

Jeremy Deutsch, President, Equinix Asia-Pacific, said: “As one of the fastest-growing metros in Asia-Pacific, Osaka is gaining attention as a rising digital hub. Strengthening our presence in the market with OS3 showcases our continuous commitments to helping businesses fast-track their digital journeys with a robust yet versatile infrastructure.

“We will continue to keep an eye on new opportunities and expand Platform Equinix for more businesses in the fast-growing Asia-Pacific region to power enterprises’ success in the new era.”

In recent years, Osaka has been emerging as a new regional centre for major cloud service providers (CSPs) to improve their services and strengthen their presence in Asia-Pacific.

The metro has become a magnet for leading CSPs, including Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft, Google and Oracle.

As the shift towards hybrid multi-cloud continues, these major players are expected to keep scaling up their investments in the Kansai region to address the growing demands for high performance, consistency, security, resiliency and local data residency when it comes to cloud adoption.

According to the Global Interconnection Index Volume 5 (GXI Vol. 5), a market study published by Equinix, overall interconnection bandwidth in Osaka is predicted to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 50% to 110 Terabits per second (Tbps) from 2020 to 2024.

From a vertical perspective, the hyperscale sector is expected to lead with the highest interconnection bandwidth locally, indicating major cloud service providers’ continuously growing needs for interconnections.

Kuniko Ogawa, Managing Director, Equinix Japan, said: “With more and more local and global enterprises in Osaka shifting to a digital-first strategy, we have been seeing cloud service providers moving faster than before in this metro to support enterprises’ increasing needs.

“The opening of OS3 enables us to maintain our leadership in an evolving market and help businesses to build a digital infrastructure they need.

“Looking ahead, we are well poised to leverage on our global footprint and ecosystem to help businesses eliminate the distance between clouds, users and applications for optimal performance, speed and flexibility.” The global footprint of Platform Equinix spans more than 230 IBX data centres across 65 metros, providing digital infrastructure for more than 10,000 of the world’s leading businesses.

Today, Equinix operates 50 IBX data centres in Asia-Pacific across 13 metros in Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Korea and Singapore.