The overseas order landscape for Korean construction firms, long centered on Middle East plants, is rapidly changing. As advanced-industry infrastructure such as artificial intelligence (AI) data centers and semiconductor plants emerges as a new source of overseas business, Asia is rising as the key market for overseas orders.
An analysis of statistics from the International Contractors Association of Korea released Wednesday showed that Korean construction firms won 1.85 billion dollars in orders in Asia from January to May this year, up 17% from 1.58 billion dollars in the same period last year. While orders in the Middle East fell by about 90% over the same period, a series of advanced manufacturing facility and AI infrastructure projects drove overseas orders in Asia.
A representative project is the Malaysia SGW1A AIDC won by Samsung C&T in May, worth a total of 217 million dollars (about 331.5 billion won). Samsung C&T also won a project to build a new Samsung Electronics semiconductor plant in Vietnam for 151 million dollars (about 229.1 billion won).
New markets are also opening one after another. POSCO E&C won the TTT Chang ethane terminal project in Thailand for 317 million dollars (about 484.2 billion won), a country where it had no orders last year. Incheon International Airport Corporation newly pioneered the Central Asian market by winning the modernization and operation project for Urgench International Airport in Uzbekistan through a public-private partnership (PPP) worth 134 million dollars.
The types of work being ordered are also diversifying rapidly. Whereas overseas construction was once centered on oil refineries, power plants and petrochemical plants, it has recently expanded into advanced industries and operations businesses such as AI data centers, semiconductor plants, airport operations (PPP) and gas storage facilities. Analysts say firms are shifting their structure toward higher-margin businesses by expanding their scope beyond simple construction to design, project management (PM) and operations, with Hanmi Global winning the project management contract for SK hynix's Neuron In-House PM service.
The construction industry assesses that this change is not a temporary phenomenon. As global Big Tech companies expand their AI investment and countries continue competing to attract advanced manufacturing facilities, the overseas construction market is highly likely to be realigned from an energy plant-centered market to an AI infrastructure-centered one. "Middle East order volumes could grow in the second half due to reconstruction projects and others, but the trend of Asia's high-tech infrastructure establishing itself as a major axis will continue," an industry official said.
