The digital economy is seeing more people connected throughout the Asia Pacific region, with an expected smartphone penetration of 66% by 2020. The proliferation of rich media and digital solutions has resulted in a sharp growth in the amount of data generated, consumed, stored and transferred.

As Singapore journeys to a Smart Nation, it will require more uses of and reliance on data centers for areas such as cloud services, data analytics and the Internet of Things.

Currently Singapore has the largest data center market in APAC, owing to several attributes like advantageous geographic location, safe and dynamic business environment, stable power supply, and support from the government.

To retain its position as the premium hub for data centers in Asia, authorities are developing new technologies and standards that allow service providers to operate advanced data centers. In addition, the government has invested in the establishment of a Data Center Park (DCP) with an estimated rackable space of 105,000 square meters, to attract enterprises to set up their data center operations in Singapore.

But in spite of concerted efforts by regulators, developers and asset owners, challenges for the industry still remain. High property prices, space constraints, concern on cybersecurity to cater to the data center industry growth are just a few of them.

Networkworld Asia’s premium annual event Data Center Summit in August 2017 will bring together 180+ senior executives from major data center service buyers from enterprises, government departments and BFSI industry - to discuss their data consumption strategies, data center design and architecture, cloud storage procuring patterns, and other challenges such as cybersecurity and colocation.