PETALING JAYA, 24 October 2025 — Sime Darby Property Bhd has appointed IJM Construction Sdn Bhd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of IJM Corp Bhd, to construct a hyperscale data-centre facility at its Elmina Business Park in Selangor under a RM1.26 billion contract.
The award comes via Sime Darby Property’s subsidiary, Sime Darby Property (EBP Asset II) Sdn Bhd. The scope encompasses core and shell construction, associated infrastructure and commissioning of the facility. Construction is slated to start in the fourth quarter of 2025, with completion targeted for the second quarter of 2027.
Spanning approximately 77 acres, the data-centre site is part of a longer-term build-and-lease agreement signed in December 2024 with Pearl Computing Malaysia Sdn Bhd, a subsidiary of Raiden APAC Pte Ltd.
Strategic Significance & Implications
For Sime Darby Property, the contract award underscores its strategy to develop Elmina Business Park into a technology-led, industrial and data-infrastructure hub positioning Malaysia for the next wave of digital economy activity. As Group MD & CEO Datuk Seri Azmir Merican remarked: “This contract award marks a significant milestone in our journey to develop Malaysia’s next-generation digital backbone.”
For IJM Corp and IJM Construction, the win deepens their position in the country’s growing hyperscale and mission-critical infrastructure sector, an area witnessing ballooning demand given Southeast Asia’s digital growth, cloud adoption and regional data-centre build-outs.
From a broader Asian-perspective, the project is a strong signal that Malaysia is vying to capture a larger share of the global data-centre and cloud-infrastructure value chain. The size of the contract, its early start and the long completion horizon reflect confidence in downstream demand for digital services, AI-driven workloads, and resilient infrastructure in the region.
Market & Risk Considerations
- Execution risk: Given the size and complexity of the project, timely delivery, compliance with technical-specs, infrastructure readiness (power, connectivity, cooling) and cost-control will be critical.
- Macro tailwinds: The push aligns with Malaysia’s industrial shift, growing cloud services demand, and regional supply-chain diversification. The neighbouring ecosystem may benefit, real estate, construction, data-centre services, utilities.
- Regulatory / sustainability dimension: Hyperscale data-centres are energy-intensive. The success of the facility and its appeal to tenants will depend on sustainable design, power-cost competitiveness and compliance with evolving environmental standards.
- Competitive backdrop: With global players eyeing Southeast Asia, Malaysia is competing against Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, speed, land cost, regulation and power-supply reliability will matter.
Outlook
With construction scheduled to begin soon and completion set for early-2027, the contract will likely contribute to IJM Construction’s order-book visibility and Sime Darby Property’s recurring income profile (through lease-back) over the medium term. Investors and stakeholders should monitor progress, tenant sign-up, construction milestones and operational commissioning as key inflection points.
