San Francisco: Snowflake, a leading global cloud computing company, has identified Malaysia as one of its top priority markets for expansion within the ASEAN region. This decision comes amidst increasing interest from global companies in investing in open data and data centres in the country.
According to BERNAMA News Agency, Snowflake’s ASEAN Managing Director, Satchit Joglekar, emphasized the significant investments from data centre providers and hyperscalers in Malaysia, noting that major players like AWS have announced or launched local infrastructure in the region. Joglekar stated, “Malaysia is absolutely our top priority right now for investment and expansion. We are closely monitoring this development and will continue to support our Malaysian customers by working closely with our cloud partners like AWS.”
The company, which powers the Data Cloud platform, aims to unify, manage, and analyze data with high performance across different cloud providers. Snowflake is committed to bolstering its local presence in Malaysia, investing in both human resources and technological support, as well as enhancing its partner ecosystem to ensure success for local customers.
Snowflake’s focus on Malaysia aligns with the country’s substantial digital investment approval of RM278 billion since 2021, including RM184.7 billion from data centre and cloud-related projects. Malaysia’s data centre market is forecasted to grow to US$13.57 billion by 2030, spurred by a 22.38% annual growth rate, as reported by the Malaysian Investment Development Authority.
Further underscoring Malaysia’s potential, the nation recently achieved the top position in the Open Data Inventory (ODIN) 2024/25 rankings, with a score of 90 overall and a near-perfect 99 in data openness, surpassing 198 countries.
Joglekar highlighted Snowflake’s expanded operations across ASEAN, noting that nearly half of their regional customers are now located outside Singapore, with significant representation in major ASEAN economies such as Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Malaysia. He cited successful case studies like that of XL Axiata in Indonesia, where Snowflake facilitated a transformation to cloud infrastructure, resulting in cost savings and improved analytics.
Snowflake’s annual summit, held in San Francisco, is anticipated to attract 18,000 to 20,000 participants, showcasing the company’s global reach and influence. San Francisco, as a hub of technological innovation, continues to play a pivotal role in shaping developments in artificial intelligence and cloud computing.