Malaysia reins in data centre growth, complicating China’s AI chip access

Malaysia, a hotspot for data centres, is reining in the pace of expansion in a move industry insiders and analysts expect will hinder China’s efforts to gain access to powerful chips that are crucial to improving its artificial intelligence capabilities.

The Southeast Asian country has drawn in data centre investments from US technology giants like Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet’s Google and their Chinese counterparts Tencent, Huawei and Alibaba in recent years, spurred by cheap land and electricity costs and robust local AI demand prospects.

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