Latest news with #datacenter
Wall Street Journal
8 hours ago
- Business
- Wall Street Journal
Brookfield Pledges Up to $10 Billion for AI Data Center in Sweden
Brookfield Asset Management said it would invest up to 95 billion Swedish kronor ($9.87 billion) into an artificial-intelligence data center in Sweden, doubling down on efforts to secure the infrastructure needed to power the technology. The New York-based asset manager said the AI investment, one of its largest in Europe, would go toward a large data center in Strangnas, some 50 miles west of Stockholm. Brookfield agreed to sign an agreement for roughly 3.77 million square feet of land to host the facility, for which construction will take 10 to 15 years. 'To compete in the development of AI and realize its economic productivity, it is important to invest at scale in the infrastructure underpinning this technology,' Sikander Rashid, Brookfield's head of Europe, said. Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson welcomed the move in a post on X, saying the data center would be one of the largest of its kind in Europe. The investment pledge comes months after the company outlined an infrastructure investment program in France to the tune of 20 billion euros ($22.74 billion), including 10 billion euros for an AI factory in the country. Brookfield's growing spending commitments underscore efforts from the asset manager to secure key infrastructure needed to power AI and not fall behind tech giants that have been pouring billions of dollars into data centers since the debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT ushered in a spending bonanza. Microsoft in October unveiled plans to spend about $4.75 billion over the next two years in cloud and AI infrastructure in Italy. said in June that it was planning to invest 17.8 billion euros through 2040 to expand its logistics network and cloud infrastructure in Germany. The e-commerce giant also laid out plans to invest 15.7 billion euros over the next decade to expand its cloud services in Spain. Write to Mauro Orru at
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Legrand Strengthens Its Positions as World Champion in Datacenters With the Acquisition of Linkk Busway Systems in Asia
LIMOGES, France, June 03, 2025--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Regulatory News: Legrand (Paris:LR) is pursuing its active bolt-on acquisition strategy with today's announcement of Linkk Busway Systems1. Linkk Busway Systems is an Asian reference specialist in power busbars, particularly for datacenters' grey space. Based in Malaysia, in Beranang, Selangor, Linkk Busway Systems employs over 240 people and generates an annual revenue of around €45 million. Benoît Coquart, Legrand's Chief Executive Officer; commented:"We are thrilled to announce this acquisition, our third since the beginning of the year, and the second one in the fast-growing datacenter market, which already accounted for 20% of Group proforma sales in 2024. It is fully in line with our strategic ambitions for 2030, in particular the strengthening of our positions in buoyant segments linked to the energy and digital transition." KEY FINANCIAL DATES 2025 first-half results : July 31, 2025''Quiet period2" starts : July 1, 2025 ABOUT LEGRAND Legrand is the global specialist in electrical and digital building infrastructures. Its comprehensive offering of solutions for residential, commercial, and datacenter markets makes it a benchmark for customers Group harnesses technological and societal trends with lasting impacts on buildings with the purpose of improving life by transforming the spaces where people live, work and meet with electrical, digital infrastructures and connected solutions that are simple, innovative and on an approach that involves all teams and stakeholders, Legrand is pursuing a strategy of profitable and responsible growth driven by acquisitions and innovation, with a steady flow of new offerings that include products with enhanced value in use (energy and digital transition solutions: datacenters, digital lifestyles and energy transition offerings).Legrand reported sales of €8.4 billion in 2023. The company is listed on Euronext Paris and is a component stock of the CAC 40, CAC 40 ESG and CAC SBT 1.5 indexes. (code ISIN FR0010307819). 1 Subject to customary closing conditions2 Period of time when all communication is suspended in the run-up to publication of results Readers are invited to verify the authenticity of Legrand press releases with the CertiDox app. Learn more at View source version on Contacts INVESTOR RELATIONS & FINANCIAL COMMUNICATIONRonan MARC (Legrand) +33 1 49 72 53 53. PRESS RELATIONSLucie DAUDIGNY (TBWA) +33 6 77 20 71 11.
Geek Wire
6 days ago
- Business
- Geek Wire
Filing: PowerLattice Technologies, a secretive startup with connections to Intel, is raising cash
Former VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger speaks at VMworld 2018. (VMware Photo) A stealthy new company based in Southwest Washington called PowerLattice Technologies is raising cash, according to new SEC filings. The company filed two forms this week that show more than $22 million raised. PowerLattice is 'bringing paradigm shift in power delivery solutions for AI, datacenter and high performance compute processors,' according to its website. The startup lists its headquarters at a co-working space in Camas, Wash. We've reached out to the company for more details. Former Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger is listed a director on one of the filings. Gelsinger spent more than three decades at Intel, more recently as its CEO from 2021 to December 2024. He previously led VMWare as CEO for more than eight years. Steve Fu, a semiconductor industry vet and a partner at Silicon Valley VC firm Celesta, is also listed as a director. Celsta's founding partner Lip-Bu Tan is the current CEO at Intel. The executives listed on the filings are Peng Zou, Sujith Dermal, and Gang Gen. A search on LinkedIn for those names shows potential connections to NUVIA, a chip design startup acquired by Qualcomm in 2021. The Oregonian reported on the filings on Tuesday.
Bloomberg
7 days ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
Nvidia's Huang Can Navigate US-China Risks: Cleo's Kunst
Live on Bloomberg TV CC-Transcript 00:00Sarah, I recognize that we're giving you these headlines out of context, but I guess my question to you is how much should we still not understand about what the US government intends to do with sales of US technology to China? And by that measure, how much uncertainty is there around the growth potential for some of these companies? I mean, China represents a $15 billion datacentre market. Absolutely. The reality is that there is uncertainty everywhere. We might know as much as the government does. Right, because a lot of these sort of tariffs, a lot of these bans feel like they're happening in real time. They're happening in sort of a reactive manner. And so it is very much kind of anybody's guess. That being said, one thing that I keep coming back to is that Jensen is not new to having to navigate the U.S. and China. This was a problem with the last administration. He's somebody who understands the Asian markets incredibly, incredibly well, obviously. And so I think that he is probably the best suited CEO for this almost impossible task of guessing what two very mercurial superpowers are going to do on a day to day basis about where he can sell his product. Let me just correct myself. I meant $50 billion data center market in China by 2026. Sara, I'm glad you bring up Jensen's ability to navigate both markets. Is there another CEO or is there another company that kind of is in the middle of all this in the same way that Nvidia is? You know, I think obviously Taiwan Semiconductor, which is, you know, long been one of my favorite names on the street. You know, they're in Taiwan, so they certainly understand this well. And we've seen a lot of their supply chain move out of Taiwan over the last, you know, handful of years for for sort of China centric reasons. And now they're that's probably good for them as they navigate, you know, the U.S.. And so, yes, there are other leaders, I think, particularly who have a deep understanding of China, of the Asian market and where this technology is going. The problem with the U.S. side of the equation is you can't really understand deeply what's going to happen because it changes day by day. And there isn't necessarily a huge, coherent strategy there. Absolutely, Sarah. And I mean, I'm just going through the 10-Q now, and we should just point out to our viewers, I mean, they are spending a lot of time in this 10-Q, not only talking about the export controls on the U.S. side, but also, of course, a lot of the regulations on the Chinese side as well as they call it, a very complex situation, almost a way too long and lengthy to read here on air. But it's something I think every investor should check out. And I hope that Jensen is asked about this on the conference call at five. I do want to ask you, though, about just the investor ability right now in this space beyond in video. I mean, you run a VC fund, you've got several investments in AI startups, like for a Thought Lighter, Athena and a few others as well. When we talk about sort of the next phase of the A.I. trade, if you will, there investment trade, where do you think that success will be in terms of the application, in terms of the use cases and of course in terms of the companies? Of course. I mean, I've got to talk my book, right? I have a really interesting range of names. Companies like Brock with a Q, not not the Elan one with a K, you know, And they are a team that that spun out of Google early on to make tensor processing units originally for self-driving cars. And so they're doing some really, really interesting stuff at the chip level. And that's a name that, you know, I see a ton of secondary interest from I am holding. But, you know, I think that that's a name that's going to continue to do really well. I have other names like Kobold Metals, which is a Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos backed, really interesting company that uses A.I. for rare Earth mineral mining. And so, you know, they have been doing some really exciting stuff recently, too. And so I think that the A.I. trade is here to stay. It's just that we've moved, I think, really far away from the sort of chat bots open I of last year. Yeah. And now see more actual use cases. Well that's an I'm curious with some of these companies and not necessarily the ones in your portfolio, I mean I've seen quite a few that are basically just taking, you know, open air or something or a software layer over that and calling it a new product. We're are we getting innovation out of this? I mean, beyond the big boys that we know have actually created something new, is there real innovation? Yeah, I think there is. I think that there is innovation in terms of where the technology is going. I think that a lot of it day to day is going to be baked in and we're not necessarily going to feel it. One of the funny things when people say, you know, when is Apple going to get in the air game is what do you think Siri is? Right. But we're so used to it on a day by day basis or when you Google and even if you're not using Gemini, Google's Google's A.I. solution, the some of those snippets that you're getting at the top, the the order in which they're ranking your questions, your algorithms on social media, that's all I the best day AI is not something that has to sort of announce itself as A.I., It's just whatever you're looking for, whatever you're doing is better, is easier, is simpler. And I think that that's the layer that people sort of take for granted, even though there's a lot of really interesting day to day innovation there.
Forbes
27-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Gas, Coal, Renewables Battle Over Power For Meta's New Data Center
Power lines in California. Meta, the company that owns Facebook, are planning a new AI data center, the company's largest yet, in Richland Parish, Louisiana. The local utility company, Entergy, has plans to build three new gas-fired power plants to supply the additional electricity needed for the data center. Also reported last week was that Meta got some pushback from a U.S. Senator, who challenged the benefits of using natural gas to power the new data canter. The new data center is an enormous infrastructure layout of 4 million square feet, which is equivalent to 70 football fields, and costing $10 billion. The three new gas plants would have a total capacity of 2,260 MW (megawatts). But there are alternative power sources, such as renewables (wind, solar and battery storage), geothermal, and nuclear. What are the pros and cons? Let's look at each of these. First, natural gas is appealing because the U.S. produces an enormous amount of gas, the most in the world, of over 115 Bcfd (billion cubic feet per day). Also, gas power plants provide 43% of grid electricity in the U.S., so it would be an extension of technology that the country already relies upon. Second is coal. The U.S has about 200 coal-fired power plants remaining, but these are due to be turned off by 2040. Coal burns dirty in both particulates that can cause asthma in the young and the old, plus greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that are twice as intense as burning natural gas. President Trump recently signed an executive order to resuscitate coal to revitalize an industry that has collapsed, presumably because he doesn't recognize the dangers of burning coal (his drill, baby, drill mantra testifies to this). If Trump's new order were to force all of the 200 remaining coal power stations to continue operating, instead of closing by 2040, this would reduce the total of 1,000 GW of new electricity needed by 2040, but only by a fraction 6% - 10%. A new analysis by Rystad Energy is telling. Table 1 shows in four major precincts that fossil sources of electric power are flattening or falling, except for Asia-Pacific (excluding China). In contrast, renewables are rising and catching up in their percentages. New nuclear energy is at the commercial starting gate, by both accounts. Table 1. Rystad argue that global power demand will increase strongly this year and in years ahead. But they predict fossil fuels will peak shortly in the power sector. They also expect that the growth rate of low-carbon sources, meaning renewables, will soon meet the increase in power demand. Third is nuclear. Trump also unleashed on May 23 executive orders on accelerating nuclear technologies. As energy secretary Chris Wright summarized, 'With the emergence of AI and President Trump's pro-American manufacturing policies at work, American civil nuclear energy is being unleashed at the perfect time. Nuclear has the potential to be America's greatest source of energy addition. It works whether the wind is blowing, or the sun is shining, is possible anywhere and at different scales.' AI is quoted as justification for nuclear, especially when the sun doesn't shine or the wind doesn't blow. But this is inaccurate as grid-scale storage batteries (BESS) can resolve this problem. For example, in the state of South Australia renewables plus batteries have has been providing 72% of grid electricity, and this is expected to rise to 100% by 2027. Renewables plus batteries have proven the stability of renewables commercially. Rystad Energy has reported that BESS set a record 200 gigawatt-hours (GWh) globally last year, implying a growth rate of 80%. Beginning at 0.5 terawatts (TW) in 2024, total BESS capacity will rise by almost ten times to over 4 TW by 2040. Three other things have been overlooked in Wright's statement above. First, the cost of new nuclear reactors, whether traditional reactors or SMRs, is substantially higher than renewable energies (see below). Second is the ubiquitous threat of being exposed to nuclear radiation, either from nuclear accidents or from underground storage of nuclear waste. Third is that nuclear energy, including SMRs, is at the commercial starting gate. But the lure of nuclear remains for some. Valar Atomics, a California startup company, has plans to test a small SMR at an energy research center in Utah by next summer. Fourth is renewables. As well as commercial success in Australia, 90% of new energy in the U.S. in 2024 was provided by wind and solar renewables. The status of global renewables can be seen in Table 1 above. Renewables are rising and catching up in their percentages to fossil sources of electric power, while in the U.S administration renewables are the sounds of silence. There are three clear advantages of renewables. One is commercial success of current operations. Two is cheaper cost, particularly PV solar and storage batteries, as laid out below. Three is maturity of technology. Fervo Energy's enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) has proven an exciting pilot case involving 2 wells in Nevada that produce 3.5 MW of power to a local utility and Google. They've also drilled about 20 new wells out of about 100 planned in a project at Cape Station in Utah. Much of this 500 MW of power has already been contracted to California and Shell, which will begin in 2026. The future is promising but right now it's at the commercial starting gate. Nuclear SMRs are also unproven commercially—a recent contract was canceled by a Utah community when the SMR price was 50% higher than agreed to. One way to compare costs of electricity sources for data centers is by calculating the unsubsidized levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) operations in 2023. These are shown in Table 2, where each category has a range of LCOEs. LCOE takes into account all of the costs associated with building, operating, and maintaining a power plant, as well as the amount of electricity the plant is expected to produce over its lifetime. These are unsubsidized numbers, which implies that the numbers for renewable energies could be lower if installations are leveraged with tax credits available from the Inflation Reduction Act. Table 2. US Levelized cost of electricity in 2023. It has been reported that battery costs in China are coming down by 40%. With this, the table shows the cost advantage lies with renewables plus grid-batteries. A similar table has been provided by CSIRO in Australia. A study by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) has concluded that 'The LCOE [levelized cost of electricity] cost range for variable renewables with integration costs is the lowest of all new-build power technologies in 2023 and 2030'. The costs include solar or wind production, transmission, and storage of electricity. After 2030, CSIRO finds SMR nuclear energy would be at least three times more expensive than renewable energies in Australia. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), is the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. Last Wednesday, the senator sent a letter to Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, querying the carbon footprint of the new data center in Louisiana. Meta had committed to net-zero emissions in all of its business activities, such as its operations and supply chain, and even use of its products by consumers. As it turns out though, their carbon footprint is larger now than it was in the 2020 commitment. The letter wanted to know how much energy would be used by the data center, and especially how much GHG emissions would arise from the gas-fired power source. Apparently, Meta has previously tried to offset its traditional electricity usage by equivalent purchases of renewable energies. The environmental response to this is simple: empower the new data center by solar and battery storage rather than natural gas. The future will see many such data centers, driven by AI, constructed in the U.S. Decisions will have to be made over and over again about empowering these new data centers, and the roadmap outlined above will be constructive.
