Thailand: The Demand and Policy Is in Place. The Operators Need You. Here Is How to Be Ready. Every time you use TrueMoney to split a bill, check your balance on KBank’s app, stream on TrueVisions, or pay for a Grab or Bolt ride, a request leaves your device and arrives somewhere. Not in the cloud in the abstract sense. In a purpose-built building. A data center building in Pathum Thani, Bangkok, Chonburi, or Rayong, staffed by engineers and technicians keeping systems runnin

James Soh This article speaks to all three audiences: C-level leadership, design and construction specialists, and operational leaders and the operations workforce. Let me tell you about a moment of recognition. Earlier this year I was studying for the NVIDIA NCA-AIIO certification. I came to it as someone with more than 30 years in the data center industry, and before that, as a systems administrator on a DECVax minicomputer cluster. I sat with the material on GPU architectu

Article 4: The Operations Workforce the AI DC Needs James Soh This article speaks most directly to operational leaders. The implications run through to C-level leadership and the operations workforce. There is a boundary that exists in almost every data center operations team even in Southeast Asia. It runs along the edge of the data hall. On one side, the facilities team. Power, cooling, physical infrastructure, building management systems. On the other side, the compute. Se

The AI DC Is Not a Data Center with GPUs This article speaks most directly to design and construction specialists. The implications run through to operations teams. I want to say something directly to the design and construction professionals reading this. You are not doing anything wrong. Your methodology is sound. Your experience is real. The engineering discipline you have built over years of delivering precision facilities (power distribution, MEP design, structural engin

The Blind Spot the Industry Built Into Itself James Soh This article speaks most directly to C-level leadership and business planners. The implications run through to design and construction teams. Article 1 closed with a proposition. The machine is the building again. For those of us who have spent careers in the data center industry, that is not just a historical observation. It is a strategic reorientation. And it raises an immediate question for C-level leadership: does y

Article 1: The Machine Was the Building This article speaks to all three audiences: C-level leadership, design and construction specialists, and the operations workforce. Before there were data centers, there was the machine. In the 1960s and 1970s, you did not build a facility and then decide what to put in it. You acquired the machine and built everything around it. The IBM System/360, the DEC VAX, the Cray supercomputer. The room existed to serve the computer. The power, t

A Practical Guide for Investment Analysis, Project Finance, and Business Development Professionals The Data Center Primer addresses three distinct audiences: non-technical business and investment professionals, newcomers to the data center ecosystem, and mid-career professionals broadening their expertise. For the first group—investment analysts, project finance managers, and business development professionals—we've created a standalone companion guide. Why? Evaluating data

Beyond the Battery Room: The People and Governance Behind Southeast Asia’s AI Build-Out James Soh Picture a hyperscaler’s site evaluation team. They have been to six campuses this week across Johor, Batam, and Singapore. They are not evaluating one facility. They are building a regional infrastructure strategy for a client whose deployment timeline is driven by GPU supply windows and whose board is watching the AI capital race against the rest of the region. They have seen th

James Soh Two facilities, one decision. The first is a data center in the region that has been running reliably for fifteen years. VRLA batteries in a dedicated room, approved under the codes of its era, maintained by a team that knows every string and knows what a bad cell smells like before the alarm triggers. An AI tenant is now asking about in-hall ESS. The project team has responded with a procurement document. It says “Li-ion.” The second facility is at concept design s

Battery Strategy as an Asset and Infrastructure Decision James Soh The occupancy permit is delayed. The Authority Having Jurisdiction (the AHJ, the body with legal authority to inspect, approve, and certify that a building is safe to occupy) has flagged issues during inspection that should have been caught earlier. The battery capacity was changed during the project. The drawings and specifications were updated. But the documentation submitted to the AHJ was not. The fixes ar

James Soh. First published on 20th of August, 2025. In this newsletter, I revisit and build upon insights first shared in my March 2017 rticle, From the Trenches . Since then, the Asian data center landscape has evolved rapidly, bringing new challenges and opportunities. Drawing from ongoing projects and fresh market developments, this issue offers practical, ground-level perspectives to help you with dealing with today’s fast-growing data center ecosystem. 1. Introduction B

Mapping and Leveraging Your Professional Expertise James Soh, originally published 19th of January, 2026. 💡 The Difference Between Having Experience and Owning Expertise Marcus and David both worked through a major $15M facility refresh. Both learned about liquid cooling and high-density power. However, when a recruiter called about a regional leadership role, Marcus could only offer generic bullet points: "Participated in facility refresh. Completed training." David took a

Mapping and Leveraging Your Professional Expertise James Soh, originally published 20th of January, 2026. The 80% Reality: An Integrated Framework for the Data Center Majority While industry headlines focus on the "Marketing Narrative" —a world of 100–500MW greenfield hyperscale campuses and "lights-out" automation—the Operational Reality is fundamentally different. 70–80% of data center professionals work in mature facilities aged 8–25 years. These established sites repr

Author: James Soh In a video discussion recorded in December 2025, James Soh and Chris Lamb from First Point Group delve into the "Data Center Primer," ( https://a.co/d/0cvrhjga ) a foundational book aimed at clarifying industry concepts for non-technical professionals. The conversation emphasizes three key perspectives from the first chapter and chapter 12: - The digital fortress - The engine of the internet - The digital factory These insights highlight the critical role o

Author: James Soh, Kindle ebook published on 22th of October, 2025. Paperback edition on 28th of October 2025, Hardcover edition on 12th of November, 2025. The Data Center Primer by James Soh is a comprehensive guide to the rapidly evolving data center ecosystem, which serves as the foundational infrastructure for artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and machine learning. Drawing from over 30 years of experience in designing and managing facilities across Southeast Asia

December 16, 2025 James Soh A modern data center showcasing rows of servers in a high-tech environment. If you've ever been confused by terms like "containerized data center," "prefabricated module," "skids," or "prefab data halls," you're not alone. The data center industry uses these terms inconsistently, creating significant ambiguity for professionals trying to understand what vendors are actually offering. Adding to the confusion, vendors from construction fields (prefab