NTT Com Asia Limited is the wholly owned subsidiary of NTT Communications Corporation, the Global Data, IP, Voice service arm of Asia’s largest telecommunications company – Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation from Japan. The company set up in Hong Kong in 1999 and provides a full range of ICT turnkey solutions including connectivity, security, data centre, managed services and hosting. At the end of last year, NTT Com opened a new state-of-the-art data centre in Tai Po, Hong Kong to further enhance its global data centre capabilities. NTT Com boasts over 90 data centres worldwide to meet the company’s rapidly growing client demand.

Both Ways - Hong Kong is the Best Location to do Business
Hong Kong is the key regional network and service hub for NTT Com. Mr Masaaki Moribayashi, President and CEO of NTT Com Asia Limited explained why: “Many American and European companies see Hong Kong as the gateway to China and Asia. The market in China is huge and different, so it is safer and smarter to do it via Hong Kong. If these companies have to select one place in Asia, they choose Hong Kong as the best place to build their stepping stone. Chinese companies wanting to expand their business globally also internationalise via Hong Kong. Both ways, Hong Kong is the best location to do business.”

Mr Moribayashi also believes Hong Kong is an easy place to conduct business. The city has a diverse population, good business environment including its infrastructure, workforce, economic and political stability and an open telecoms market policy.

Hong Kong is a Strategic Foothold of NTT Group
Hong Kong is an integral part of NTT Com’s business. So when the original data centre became fully occupied in 2007, there was an urgent need for expansion.

The new data centre in Tai Po went into service at the end of 2007. It has five floors and the infrastructure is built on a just-in-time basis to meet client demand. In the first phase, 600 racks occupying the first floor have been installed ahead of schedule, and in less than 6 months more than 50% of the available racks are being used. NTT Com Asia had conservatively estimated that it would take four years to fill the initial planned capacity; but based on current demand for high quality data centre services, Mr Moribayashi believes the first phase of the centre would be fully occupied within 2 years. This higher than expected growth reflects the up trends of outsourcing in Hong Kong and specially important, the increasing demand for data centre which could provide high electrical power density in the range of 200-300W/ft2 or up to 7.5KVA per rack. This high level of power requirement is the core design criteria for the new data centre and is almost 5 times higher than the norm back in 2001.

Best Telecommunications Infrastructure
Mr Moribayashi believes Hong Kong has the best telecommunications infrastructure in the region. “Locating your servers in Hong Kong you can serve the rest of the world,” he said. This has meant NTT Com Asia has been able to build an enviable client base, including multinationals from Japan, US and Europe, and Mainland Chinese enterprises that want to expand their business outside of China, as well as many smaller IT and web companies. The company has successfully developed its business on the quality of customer service.

“NTT Group always considers outage issues and has lots of contingency plans and redundant networks to ensure clients have the highest network availability at a reasonable price,” Mr Moribayashi said. For example, these contingencies ensured 99% of NTT Com Asia’s customers’ network services were resumed within 48 hours of the 2006 Taiwan earthquake.

It’s Easy to Adapt to the Hong Kong Lifestyle
Mr Moribayashi has worked in the US and Japan and came with his family to Hong Kong in November 2006 when he was appointed CEO and President of NTT Com Asia Limited. Mr Moribayashi concludes, “As a company, we enjoy the business environment here and the huge market potential in the region. Personally, I like living and working in Hong Kong. It is very safe and convenient and the choice of food for Japanese people is excellent, which makes it very easy to adapt.”