(Bloomberg) — Amazon.com Inc. plans to spend $9 billion to expand its cloud computing infrastructure in Singapore, the latest global technology company to boost investment in Southeast Asia.
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The spend, which will be made over the next four years, will double Amazon Web Services’ investment in Singapore and help it meet growing customer demand for cloud services and accelerate adoption of intelligence artificial, the company announced Tuesday.
AWS, which sells software and data storage for rent from massive server farms, has expanded its presence outside the United States in recent years, with much of that investment targeting Asian markets. Companies ranging from Microsoft Corp. Apple Inc. are also expanding into the Southeast Asian market of more than 650 million people, in part to diversify away from China and reduce geopolitical risks amid tensions between Beijing and Washington.
Including the investment in Singapore, AWS this year announced plans to spend about $35 billion outside the United States, including in Japan, Saudi Arabia and Mexico. The company is also setting up data center clusters in Malaysia and Thailand.
Amazon said last month that AWS was on track to generate more than $100 billion in sales in a year for the first time. Amazon executives say AWS benefits from the company’s technology modernization plans as well as demand for AI services.
The announcement came as part of an AWS ASEAN summit in Singapore, where AI took center stage with a series of initiatives from the US company. The city-state was the first data center region created by AWS in Asia.
“This investment will create a ripple effect across Singapore by increasing economic growth and cloud adoption,” said AWS Country Manager Priscilla Chong.
Amazon estimates that its planned investment will support an average of 12,300 full-time equivalent jobs in local businesses in Singapore each year. The company will also host workshops for more than 100 companies over two years, partnering with the Singapore government to help small businesses leverage generative AI.
Singapore has become a hub for U.S. companies in Asia, such as Meta Platforms Inc. and Alphabet Inc., and is seen as a gateway to the broader Southeast Asia region, which is expected to experience rapid growth.
Microsoft, Amazon’s biggest rival in cloud services, toured local economies last week, with CEO Satya Nadella announcing a series of new investments and initiatives for Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.
–With help from Matt Day.
(Updates with executive comment in seventh paragraph)
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