Global provider of retail colocation services Equinix announced a plan to build a second data center in Hong Kong, as the company's first facility on the island has become more than two-thirds occupied.

The company plans to invest $63m total in construction of the data center, which at full build-out will provide more than 1,450 cabinet-equivalents. The first phase, which Equinix expects to cost about $20m, will bring about 450 cabinet-equivalents on the market. The provider plans to bring the first phase online in the third quarter of 2011. 

Jonathan Leung, managing director for Equinix, Greater China, said Hong Kong was a critical data center market for global customers. "For the past two years, Equinix has been expanding its HK1 IBX data center to meet increasing demand, which is currently operating at more than 70 percent utilization," he said in a statement. 

In the Hong Kong market, Equinix caters to multinationals, banking and financial services companies and providers of IT services The island has one of the largest concentrations of banking and financial companies in the region. 

The new facility will be located near the company's first data center in Hong Kong and will have direct fiber connections to the first facility to provide low-latency access to financial service firms that have equipment at the existing data center. 

This is the fourth in a string of recent Asia Pacific expansion announcements Equinix has made. It was preceded by news of expansion in existing data centers in Sydney and Singapore and an entry into the Shanghai market through partnership with a local provider Shanghai Data Solution.