An aerial view of WHA Eastern Seaboard Industrial Estate in Rayong. (Photo: WHA Corp)

WHA Corporation, Thailand's largest industrial estate developer, expects rising demand from foreign manufacturers and companies to trigger a surge in land sales in the second half of the year.

The Bangkok-based company sees land sales jumping to 224 hectares between July and December, an increase of about 40% from the first half, Chief Financial Officer Natthapatt Tanboon-Ek said in an interview Wednesday. The largest contracts will be for two data-centre projects over the next few months, he said, declining to specify the buyers.

Southeast Asia's second-largest economy is offering tax and other incentives to attract new investment from companies such as BYD (Build Your Dreams) Limited, Chongqing Changan Automobile Ltd and Western Digital Corp. The ruling Pheu Thai party is banking on new foreign investment to reinvigorate economic growth and employment after a months-long delay in passing the government’s annual budget and high household debt dented domestic consumption.

"We are very bullish with our outlook for the rest of 2024 as several foreign manufacturers have accelerated their land purchases," Mr Natthapatt said. "Strong demand has allowed us to raise land prices by double digits compared with 2023."

More than half of the new land buyers are Chinese companies in industries such as automobiles, electronics and electrical appliances, according to Mr Natthapatt. Surging property sales are likely to help WHA achieve record sales and net income in 2024, he said.

The Thai government approved investment applications worth 458 billion baht (US$13.5 billion) in the first half of the year, up 35% from the same period in 2023, led by electronics, automobile and electrical appliance projects, according to the Board of Investment. Amazon.com Incorporated's web services division and Australia's NEXTDC Ltd are among the foreign companies that have announced plans for new data-centre investments in Thailand to tap rising demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and cloud-computing services.

WHA's net income almost doubled in the first half to 2.65 billion baht. Its shares have gained almost 3% this year, compared with a 3.6% decline in the benchmark SET Index.