Written by
David Chow, CFA
Director
Azure Capital
YTL Power International: Driving Energy, Utilities, and Data Center Growth
May 27, 2025
We next met up with Dato Yeoh Seok Hong from YTL International. He is responsible for developing the power and utility businesses of YTL Power International. He also sits on the boards of YTL’s other subsidiaries.
We had a fruitful discussion on power generation concerning Serjaya operations in Singapore under YTL PowerSeraya (YTLPS) which operates primarily on Jurong Island in Singapore, with a focus on electricity generation and bundled multi-utility services. They have a licensed generating capacity of 3,100 MW and are one of Singapore’s largest electricity generators. YTLPS also has a retail arm, Seraya Energy, and a physical oil trading arm, PetroSeraya.
For power generation:
YTL Power’s core business is generating and distributing electricity through its diverse portfolio of power plants, including combined-cycle, gas-fired, steam, and co-generation plants.
Water and Sewerage:
They also operate water and sewage services companies, such as Wessex Water in the UK, which provides essential utilities.
Telecommunications:
YTL Power has a stake in YTL Communications, which provides broadband and telecommunications services.
Other Business Segments:
YTL Power also engages in digital technologies, data centers, and other investment holding activities.
Geographical Presence:
YTL Power has operations and projects in Malaysia, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Indonesia, Jordan, and the Netherlands, among others.
In recent years, they have been riding the data centre boom in Malaysia by simply partnering with Nvidia and building and owning data centers. For this meeting, we have also checked with management on the progress of the capacity which is earmarked to be launched from May 2025 and are heartened to hear that it is progressing still despite the uncertainty caused by the Trump administration. We did our cross checks with Tenega with regards to the growth of capacity in their Electricity Supply Agreement (ESA) for data centres and found it to be still growing as well.
Going forward, as a vital hub in tech manufacturing, Malaysia relies heavily on imported components like servers, processors and networking equipment that are now costlier and harder to obtain. This disruption puts their AI ambition goals at risk and it remains to be seen whether they could negotiate with the US to navigate the US chips restrictions and concerns. If successful, this should lead to a continued growth in this area.