This 3rd-Gen Kuok Is Transforming the Family Empire With a $10B AI Bet
Kuok Meng Wei, a Stanford-educated engineer and grandson of Malaysia’s richest man, is betting big on Southeast Asia’s digital future by building data centers in Malaysia, Indonesia and beyond.
Opening Commentary:
In Southeast Asia’s fast-moving digital landscape, legacy doesn’t guarantee relevance, unless you evolve with the times.
This WargaBiz feature caught our attention for how powerfully it captures that evolution. Kuok Meng Wei, grandson of the legendary “Sugar King” Robert Kuok, is steering the family empire into the age of AI - with a $10 billion investment into modular data centers across Johor, Indonesia, and beyond.
Below is an excerpt from the original story that stood out for us, followed by a link to the full article.
Snippet (excerpt from WargaBiz, July 9, 2025):
The AI Boom and the Billion-Dollar Bet
Why all this excitement around data centers?
Because the world is generating and using more data than ever before. Artificial intelligence is now mainstream, and AI programs need a huge amount of computing power and digital storage to function. This means demand for data centers, especially high-performance ones, is exploding.
That’s where K2 comes in. Meng Wei has already invested $1 billion into the business. But he’s not stopping there. Over the next five years, he’s committing another $9 billion to grow K2’s footprint across Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand.
His goal is bold: grow K2’s capacity tenfold, from 120MW to 1,200MW by 2030.
In Indonesia, K2 has partnered with the billionaire-owned Sinar Mas Land. Together, they’re building two major data center campuses in Bekasi, East Jakarta, across 40 acres. The combined capacity will exceed 100MW, putting them among the largest players in the country.
Strategic Expansion Across Southeast Asia
The Kuok Group’s digital ambitions go far beyond Malaysia. In Indonesia, K2 has partnered with the billionaire-owned Sinar Mas Land, one of the country’s largest property developers. Together, they’re building two major data center campuses in Bekasi, East Jakarta, across 40 acres. The combined capacity will exceed 100MW, putting them among the largest players in the country.
These countries are ideal for expansion. According to Knight Frank, Southeast Asia is now one of the world’s fastest-growing regions for data infrastructure, and Malaysia is leading the charge. Tech giants including Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and Oracle have announced plans to invest more than $44 billion in the region, with over $23 billion going into Malaysia alone.
This shift is also a response to Singapore’s tighter restrictions on data center construction, which made regional markets like Johor, Jakarta, and Bangkok more attractive.