Facebook said yesterday it will invest over $1 Bn to build a data centre in Singapore, its first in Asia. 

Thomas Furlong, Facebook Vice-President of infrastructure data centres stated that the centre, which will be powered by renewable energy and adapted to the city-state's tropical climate, is expected to be operational around 2022, and will host Facebook servers and centralize its IT operations. 

The SGD1.4 Bn ($1.02 Bn) facility will be the first data centre designed and constructed by Facebook in Asia as the company increasingly relies on custom-built facilities to meet its needs, Furlong said. 

The 170,000 square metres centre will be stacked over 11 storeys, and will come with custom features to cope with the steamy temperatures, which rarely drop below 25 degrees Celsius. These include a new state-of-the-art cooling system which uses water rather than air and will work better in the humidity, as well as a building facade made of perforated, lightweight material to allow for better air flow. 

The company expects it to be run on 100 percent renewable energy, like its other data centres. It will be Facebook's 15th data centre worldwide. 

Furlong added that Facebook, which has 2.23 billion monthly active users as of the end of June, chose Singapore because of its robust infrastructure, availability of skilled labor and ease of doing business with the government. 

Tech giant Google has also built two data centres in the city state, and announced this month it was starting work on a third, bringing their investment in the sites to $850 Mn.