SINGAPORE — Living in the information era can be very convenient; if you have a query about virtually anything, you can just google it. Search engines such as Yahoo!, Google and Bing have vast amounts of information and resources culled from the Internet and can answer your questions very quickly. On the other side of that convenience is the need to house all that data that everyone wants and keep some of that secure — particularly your finance records as online shopping becomes more popular.

According to the 2013 What Is Driving The Singapore Data Centre Market survey commissioned by Digital Realty this year, 77 per cent of the interviewed companies in Singapore have three or fewer data centres, while 11 per cent have six or more.

Sixty-three per cent of the companies have built a data centre in the past 24 months. The study also indicated 78 per cent of the respondents said they plan to definitely or probably expand their data centres this year, with 82 per cent planning for next year. More than two-thirds who planned to expand this year said they prefer to locate their data centres in Singapore compared to other countries in the region.

The Web survey polled a panel of 100 information technology (IT) decision-makers from large companies with at least US$500 million (S$634 million) annual revenues and/or have at least 2,000 employees. The respondents have a responsibility for managing a data centre, contract execution for or implementing a new data centre or expanding existing data centres.

Digital Realty is one of the largest global provider of data centre solutions. The company outfits buildings with the essentials required of data centres such as cooling units, power and security.

According to its Vice-President of Portfolio Management, Asia-Pacific, Mr Paul Somers, data centres cannot run out of power as some of their clients run trading floors off these servers.

The amount of security, as well as the attention to detail, is essential in running a data centre. While they cannot disclose which of their clients run services such as trading floors, some of their top 30 global customers include JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Microsoft, IBM and Facebook.

However, due to security issues, Digital Realty only rents out the state-of-the-art space for companies which want to build their data centres. The servers on which the data resides are managed by the companies themselves, Digital Realty only ensures the racks stay cool, secure and powered.

Mr Somers spoke of the versatility companies have when they rent data centres instead of having purpose-built ones.

“For example, MAS (the Monetary Authority of Singapore) has made very stringent rules about what banks’ data centres must encompass. And the banks can’t keep up with that. They don’t have the resources to do that, so they’re coming to people like us.

“And our facility in Jurong was well in advance compliant with the guidelines that MAS wants to see for data centres. We did all that in advance knowing that was coming because we worked with one of the top security consultants in the region.”

The data centre is located at the International Business Park at Jurong East.

Mr Somers said customers are not allowed to drive into the fenced up facility. There are luggage screens like those found in the airport, crash barriers, roving security guards as well as a slew of other security measures to ensure data is protected around the clock. The facility has enough back-up generators in case of a power failure, with enough fuel to last for 48 hours.

“There is very little chance you will ever need to be on generators for 48 hours. That means the power facilities in Singapore are down so that won’t happen,” said Mr Somers.

“Singapore has a great power reliability, that’s one of the reasons why data centres are coming here. There is very slight chance of that (power outage) happening.”

And in the case power is out for more than 48 hours, the company has a service contract from suppliers who will re-supply fuel every 48 hours.

Mr Somers shared the company even provided fuel for their customers who had their own data centres when Hurricane Sandy hit New York last year.

“That’s the kind of company we are. We’re the good guys,” said Mr Somers.

“One of the reasons that Singapore is a hub for data centres is that you do not have some of the natural disaster issues that you might face — haze does not count, but we can put in filters in the air-conditioning if we need to,” he added.

“Plus, you have got a highly educated workforce, a government that is very pro-business, so that is some of the reasons we’re seeing data centre growth here.”