LG CNS completes South Korea's first overseas AI data center, a 30MW facility in Indonesia

AI data center built in Jakarta with customers already secured

LG affiliates' technologies combined to drive Asia market expansion

Visitors examine a modular AI factory display model at the LG booth during Data Centre World Asia 2026 in Singapore. [LG CNS]

LG CNS has become the first South Korean company to complete construction of an AI data center overseas.

The IT services arm of LG Group announced Monday that it has finished building a 30-megawatt AI data center in Jakarta, Indonesia — the first time a South Korean company has directly built an AI data center on foreign soil for an overseas client.

The project was commissioned by KMG, a joint venture between Indonesia's Sinar Mas Group and Korea Investment Real Asset Management. LG CNS carried out the work drawing on its design, build and operate — or DBO — capabilities developed in South Korea.

The facility was built to support high-performance computing environments powered by next-generation GPUs, with dedicated power and cooling infrastructure installed for that purpose.

To handle the intense heat generated by AI servers, LG CNS adopted a hybrid cooling architecture combining air cooling and liquid cooling. The first phase relies on an air-circulation cooling system, with a liquid cooling system to be added in subsequent phases.

LG CNS also reinforced the power supply infrastructure, building out a system capable of handling high-density environments exceeding 300 kilowatts per rack — roughly 60 times the power draw of a rack in a conventional data center.

The power infrastructure was also made redundant so that stable operations can continue through backup power even when the primary supply is interrupted.

The project also deployed a "One LG" integrated solution combining technologies from across LG Group affiliates. Centered on LG CNS's DBO capabilities, the solution brought together LG Electronics' air-conditioning systems and LG Energy Solution's batteries to deliver an integrated power, cooling and energy infrastructure.

LG CNS is currently in the design phase for subsequent construction stages. Once those are complete, the data center's total power intake capacity is expected to reach 400 megawatts.

The company is also accelerating its overseas expansion. Building on its experience in Indonesia, LG CNS plans to pursue additional projects across the Asia-Pacific region, including Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines and Japan.

LG CNS is also diversifying its business lines. Beyond its existing colocation and DBO operations, the company is expanding into prefabricated modular data centers, GPU-as-a-service and liquid cooling infrastructure. The longer-term strategy is to grow into an AI factory business that integrates AI platforms and services.

"Completing the AI data center in Indonesia is a meaningful achievement that demonstrates LG CNS's ability to deliver the data center capabilities we have built up in South Korea to overseas clients, and proves our competitiveness in the global market," said Hyun Shin-kyun, president of LG CNS. "We will use this as a springboard to expand our AI data center and AI factory businesses in the Asia-Pacific region, where demand for AI computing is surging, and in global markets beyond."

Meanwhile, LG CNS reported third-quarter sales of 961.5 billion won ($720 million) in its AI and cloud segment on Friday, up 9.3 percent from the same period last year. The growth was driven by revenue from building and operating AI data centers for Samsung, as well as rising colocation sales from AI data centers under its management.

woo@heraldcorp.com