US Internet giant Google on April 3 started building one of its three planned data centres in Asia to meet fast growing online demand from the region, the company said.
"More new Internet users are coming online everyday here in Asia than anywhere else in the world," Daniel Alegre of Google said during a ceremony to begin work on the $300 million, 15 hectare (37 acre) site in Changhua county, western Taiwan.
Google also has similar centres in the United States and Europe, but none so far in Asia. The search engine giant has faced stiff competition in Asia, particularly in the China market where domestic search services, including Baidu, are household names to a 485 million-strong internet population - the world's largest.