Ready, Set, Go! The Race to Incorporate Liquid Cooling. Are You Ready?

Posted on April 16, 2024

I was recently asked about Modine expanding into the immersion cooling space, with the purchase of TMGcore’s liquid cooling assets. TMGcore is a startup offering single-phase and two-phase immersion cooling for high-density computing.

A couple compelling highlights from the linked article:

• The global data center liquid cooling market is projected to grow from 2.6B in 2023, to 7.8B in 2028, at a CAGR of 24.4%.
• Liquid cooling systems have been seen as a niche technology for crypto mining and high-performance computing, but it has long been predicted that higher densities will eventually force it into general-purpose data centers. The rise of AI systems is now seen as a catalyst for change.

* Link: https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/modine-buys-tmgcore-for-immersion-cooling-assets/

This appears to be a smart acquisition for Modine, as liquid cooling will be a requirement for all future high compute data centers / server clusters. This move will certainly pay dividends in the short-term but I think it also highlights one of the long-term risks of bringing liquid cooling to your Data Center.

Modine is betting on immersion cooling, which has yet to be proven as the best method for delivering liquid cooling to the server. This is a calculated risk with serious exposure if the real-world results don’t deliver. Liquid to chip and other hybrid cooling strategies don’t require submersion of the server hardware. It’s not clear which technology / design will win out as the prefer method for mission critical liquid cooling applications. However, the flexibility to promote Hybrid cooling designs & solutions will be an important factor to consider in your future go-to-market strategy.

We would love to hear from you if you’re interested in exploring how artificial intelligence and machine learning can optimize your M&E systems, minimize your cooling load, and maximize IT compute. EkkoSense AI recently released EkkoSim, a simulation tool that allows for multiple scenarios to be created, tested and analyzed such as;

• The addition of new central plant
• Increased IT load
• Failover scenarios
• Reconfiguration of cooling systems
• Viability of new power distribution systems
• Unlimited simulation scenario creation

EkkoSim delivers precision power, capacity and cooling simulation across the full data center infrastructure; predict and maintain optimal performance beyond the white space. Incorporate full site power and cooling distribution system visibility, monitoring, reporting and simulation, providing data center operators with all the tools needed to plan for the incorporation of new liquid cooling distribution technologies, hybrid water source cooling systems, heat recovery systems, and other hybrid cooling applications for your mission critical assets. The time is now to research, plan, invest and incorporate the cooling applications that align with your core values and provide the greatest value to your customers. 

Sincerely

Raymond Burrell 

Managing Partner @ Gemini Prime