Singapore firms dominate S-E Asia data centre funding, account for 98% of US$11.5 billion raised: report
Total of US$4.7 billion of equity has been raised this year as at Aug 25
[SINGAPORE] Five Singapore-headquartered data centre firms accounted for 98 per cent of the US$11.5 billion in equity funding raised across South-east Asia, according to research firm Tracxn.
The five firms are DayOne, Princeton Digital Group, ST Telemedia Global Data Centres (STT GDC), Singtel’s Nxera and Digital Edge.
The funding was concentrated in 19 rounds, with about 85 per cent of the US$11.5 billion raised since the start of 2024.
From the beginning of 2026 to Aug 25, a total of US$4.7 billion of equity was raised, in what is already the region’s largest funding year on record.
The capital was primarily raised by sovereign or state-linked investors, pension capital, infrastructure and private equity firms, as well as crossover growth investors, noted Tracxn.
Driving the high capital was a small number of large transactions, with data centre operator DayOne accounting for US$6.4 billion, or around 55 per cent of the total. This was followed by Princeton Digital Group with US$2.2 billion, STT GDC with US$1.3 billion, Nxera at US$806 million and Digital Edge at US$640 million.
DayOne raised US$4.5 billion in a Series C round across two closings in June this year. The funding accounted for 96 per cent of the region’s equity funding in the year to Aug 25.
Princeton Digital Group has US$2.2 billion in equity, which was raised by rounds led by Mubadala, and a US$1.3 billion preferred equity investment from Stonepeak.
However, the research firm noted that STT GDC and Nxera were funded through a different route compared with the other three operators.
“Rather than the company raising capital from investors, KKR purchased minority stakes directly from Singtel, the existing owner in each case,” said Tracxn.
KKR committed up to S$1.1 billion for a 20 per cent stake in Nxera in 2023 and, in 2024, KKR and Singtel invested S$1.8 billion for an 18.3 per cent stake in STT GDC.
In 2026, the consortium subsequently signed definitive agreements to acquire the 82 per cent stake in the company for S$6.6 billion, implying an enterprise value of S$13.8 billion.
Tracxn noted that the US$11.5 billion figure excluded debt and project financing.
Princeton Digital Group’s debt financing stood at US$1.2 billion in 2025, while Digital Edge raised US$1 billion in debt, it added.
Capital raised in Singapore, capacity built regionally
Although all five operators are based in the Republic, most of their data centre capacity is based in other parts of the region, due to land and power constraints in Singapore.
“Singapore functions as the sector’s financing domicile, while deployment spans the wider region,” the report stated.
This scarcity of capacity was evident in Singapore’s recent Data Centre Call for Applications, where more than 20 applicants vied for just four provisional allocations of 50 megawatts (MW).
Tracxn noted that DayOne has committed more than RM28 billion (US$7 billion) to Malaysia by end-2026 and is developing a 72 MW campus in Batam.
Digital Edge, while headquartered in Singapore, has no data centre presence in the city-state. However, it has data centres operations in Japan, South Korea, India, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines.
Market observers noted that Singapore remains a “tier-1” data centre market, suited for high-value inference and sovereign artificial intelligence workloads, while neighbours in the region are able to provide land and power for larger developments.
“Having strong and growing data centre markets across the region ultimately strengthens the overall digital infrastructure ecosystem,” Jeremy Deutsch, chair of Asia-Pacific Data Centre Association, told The Business Times.
He added that Singapore and other Asean markets form an increasingly interconnected cluster, with investment across the region deepening connectivity, strengthening supply chains and attracting further digital investments.
