Hong Kong to build its largest home-grown AI data centre by 2030

Hong Kong is on track to establish its biggest locally-developed AI data centre after the Hong Kong Science and Technology Park (HKSTP) and SenseTime – an AI software firm headquartered in the city – signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to collaborate on such a project.

At a ceremony covered by local media on Tuesday, HKSTP said the data centre would be built in three phases, with phase one due for completion by the end of this year and the facility targeting computing power of 40,000 petaflops – a measure used to train AI models – by 2030. Its location is still under discussion.

The centre will be equipped with a variety of graphics processing units (GPUs) from several countries, allowing companies to carry out model training.

In a statement, SenseTime said the partnership would “provide high-performance computing support to a wide range of industries, accelerating the practical deployment of Hong Kong’s AI industry, and further enhancing the city’s competitiveness in global innovation, technology, and AI development”.

The firm added that the project would also support new infrastructure, including computing power networks, as well as China’s Artificial Intelligence (AI+) initiative – a nationwide plan introduced in 2024 that seeks to broaden the country’s integration of AI in all sectors. 

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Xu Li, the CEO of SenseTime, told TVB that his company hoped to take Chinese AI products to an international market by adopting a model of “train on the mainland, process in Hong Kong, serve the world.”

Lillian Cheong, the Under Secretary for Innovation, Technology and Industry, said Hong Kong’s ability to compete globally in AI would be strengthened by initiatives including SenseTime’s domestic intelligent computing cluster, HKSTP, and a planned data-facility cluster at Sandy Ridge, which is projected to lift the city’s computing capacity to 180,000 petaflops by 2032.

During the event yesterday, HKSTP also announced that the mainland robotics and technology firm, National AI Monitoring, had moved into the Advanced Manufacturing Centre in Tseung Kwan O InnoPark, and would be focusing on the development of products for robotic experiments.