China's underwater strategy and a brand new data center for Singapore

Hi everyone, that is Lauly from Taipei.

An afternoon thunderstorm has left me stranded in a restaurant in downtown Taipei after an industry lunch, but I'm comforted knowing that an insanely busy month that included the arrival of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, a significant trade show, and a spate of tech industry annual general meetings is finally coming to an end.

And most vital of all, the newest Big Story on China's undersea cable ambitions, which I wrote along with my colleagues Annie Cheng Ting-Fang, Tsubasa Suruga and Shunsuke Tabeta, is now online.

It all began with a likelihood conversation between Annie, me and an executive from FiberHome, a blacklisted Chinese telecom equipment supplier, on the sidelines of an industry event. We were surprised by the chief's candor about his company's role in expanding China's Belt and Road Initiative from land to sea and his comment that FiberHome “doesn't care concerning the US blacklist.”

We spent months studying the worldwide submarine cable industry to see if the chief was bluffing. What we found was that China has actually built a self-sufficient submarine cable industry, from tiny components to massive cable-laying ships. After combing through data on over 80 cables for over a decade, I felt my myopia getting worse.

Our designers, editors and we reporters have put a variety of effort into the visual representation of this story. I hope you enjoy reading it.

Meanwhile, on the industry lunch I just attended, I heard suppliers talking for the second time this week about their expansion in Southeast Asia, particularly Vietnam, Thailand and Malaysia.

A senior executive at a supplier specializing in constructing semiconductors and contract manufacturing facilities told me that business in Southeast Asia will boom in the subsequent few years due to shifting supply chains. But power supply and skills shortages remain major challenges for any company.

“Can you imagine? From expert staff and accountants to human resources and legal staff… there’s a shortage in almost every respect,” he said. He couldn’t even send people from Taiwan, he added, as his company has its hands full supporting TSMC's domestic expansion.

Communication problems

China has quietly turn into a competitive player within the submarine cable industry, which was dominated by the United States and its allies over the past century, writes Nikkei Asia's Cheng Ting Fang, Liane Lauly, Tsubasa-Suruga And Shunsuke Tabeta on this special report.

Submarine cables, which carry greater than 95 percent of worldwide cross-border communications, have turn into one in every of the latest battlefields between the USA and China.

After Washington blacklisted Huawei and its undersea cable business, Wuhan-based telecom equipment maker FiberHome emerged as one in every of the driving forces behind China's efforts to construct a domestic supply chain and land projects abroad.

“The submarine cable industry is sort of a members' club. We all need the approval of other governments to ascertain connections with their countries,” said a FiberHome executive. “It's a diplomatic race.”

Grinding the gears

If you're searching for a superb work-life balance, then JD.com just isn’t the suitable company for you, founder and CEO Richard Liu recently told his employees during a video conference.

As growth in China slows and company stock prices suffer—China's five largest publicly traded technology firms have collectively lost about $1.3 trillion in market value since their 2021 peak—tech executives listed below are attempting to return to their leaner, more efficient start-up days.

You want employees work harder and produce more To sustain in China’s highly competitive web ecosystem, write Ryan McMorrow And Nian Liu for the Financial Times.

The increasing demands on tech staff run counter to Chinese President Xi Jinping's “common prosperity” campaign, which goals to cut back income inequality and promote equity. In 2021, Xi's policy initiative prompted China's Supreme Court to ban “996,” the then-standard work schedule of 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days every week.

Although the long working hours have improved somewhat, life at China's tech giants continues to be tough, employees say. “On the surface, I seem very calm,” says a developer at Tencent Games. “But the pressure is big; we’re like gears that grind until they break on account of lack of lubrication.”

Back Online

A defense company supported by the state of Singapore is constructing one in every of the first data centers Since the federal government announced that it could lift construction restrictions and increase computer capability, Nikkei Asia Tsubasa-Suruga writes.

Singapore Technologies Engineering plans to construct a seven-story facility that can boost the group's data center capability to over 30 megawatts across 4 locations in Singapore. The total investment might be around 120 million Singapore dollars (US$88.6 million) over the subsequent three years, and the project is anticipated to be accomplished in 2026.

ST Engineering's plan follows Singapore's surprise move last month to offer a minimum of 300 megawatts of additional power capability for data centers within the near future, and possibly an extra 200 megawatts or more powered by green energy. The city-state halted construction of recent data centers in 2019 on account of environmental concerns, but began submitting applications to construct recent facilities with higher environmental standards from 2022.

900 million and counting

Chinese technology champion Huawei Technologies has unveiled the newest versions of its operating system and AI training model to challenge leading US firms reminiscent of Open AI, Google, Apple and Nvidia, in line with Nikkei Asia's Liane Lauly And Cheng Ting Fang write.

Huawei says HarmonyOS Next, its answer to Google's Android operating system, might be used on all its products from the top of this 12 months, including the upcoming Mate 70 smartphone flagship series. HarmonyOS already runs on greater than 900 million devices, mainly within the Chinese market, in line with the corporate.

Huawei also introduced Harmony Intelligence and a significant update to its large AI language model Pangu, which goals to compete with Apple's Apple Intelligence and Open AI's GPT-4 LLM, respectively.

Despite the US crackdown, the corporate is betting heavily on artificial intelligence. “We are a very powerful alternative to Nvidia's (AI computing) solutions,” said Richard Yu, chairman of Huawei's Consumer Business Group.

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