Good Wednesday morning, and welcome to Data Center Digest.
We’re looking at data centers and the people, technologies, and trends that make them run.

Today’s Newsletter:

🔫 NTT and Tokyo Tech make breakthrough in beamform technology
🌍 AI workload stresses the limits of fiber in the data center
✨ CyrusOne launches first AI-branded modular data center line
Big Deals: Google admits it’s behind new Lincoln data center, PowerHouse hoping to branch out in Charlotte.
Resources: DC Frontier goes in on liquid cooling

Est. read time: 6mins, 45secs

- News -

AI’s huge fiber demand is changing data centers

AI is changing the data center landscape. Everyone knows that. What many aren’t considering are the effects these new density necessities have on tertiary components—one of these is fiber.

AI requires 5x the fiber…

Mike O’Day, who’s the CTO at Corning Fiber Optics, and recently spoke to Silverlinings about this new challenge, says: “Our initial estimates are at least five times more optical connections are going to be required in a data center as a result of how the applications are going to access and want to use artificial intelligence.”

According to O’Day, the reason for all this new fiber is the need to create an entirely new network to interconnect all of the necessary AI servers. Today, data center operators have fiber for a front-end network or a traditional cloud computing network.
For AI, though, they’re looking at bringing new back-end networks or dedicated AI networks online.

Challenges of Increased Fiber Needs

The issue is that there isn’t a lot of unused space inside data centers, so it’s not apparent where the additional fiber cables will go.

So, hyperscalers and their vendors are left not only trying to solve for heat and power density issues associated with high-performance computing, but also how to cram more fiber into less space.

With their new 2nd gen data center solutions, Corning is looking to use thinner fibers to fit 24 fibers in half the amount of space that’s currently required. 
It’s also exploring products that will help data center operators slash installation time, by removing the need for field splicing, he added.

Additional figures from the Silverlinings piece:

• The data center industry (including servers, storage, equipment, and physical infrastructure) is expected to reach $500 billion by 2027

• Data center growth slowed in 2023 to 6% vs. 17% between 2021 and 2022

• Expected 5-year CAGR in the range of 30-40% over the next 5 years

- News -

Tokyo Tech and NTT celebrate beamforming breakthrough

Data Center juggernaut NTT, alongside a team from the Tokyo Institute of Technology, made a significant breakthrough in beamforming technology.

Beamforming: some background

Beamforming is a signal processing technique used in various industries like telecommunications, radar systems, and acoustics. It focuses signal energy in specific directions, improving quality and range while reducing interference.

Benefits of beamforming include amplified signal strength, extended communication range, interference reduction, and spatial multiplexing for greater data capacity.

NTT’s breakthrough

Together with the team from Tokyo Tech, NTT has developed a phased array transmission module for the 6th generation mobile communication system (6G) in the 300GHz band.

The advancement marks the world’s first successful high-speed wireless data transmission in the 300GHz band using beamforming.

The team assembled a 4-element phased array transmission module, integrating the CMOS-IC and InP-IC on the same printed circuit board.
This module achieved a maximum data rate of 30Gbps at a communication distance of 50cm, with a 36-degree directionality control range.

What does it mean?

The partners’ breakthrough offers the potential for future developments expected in near-distance mobile communications, such as the KIOSK model and Femtocell, which are potential applications for 6G.

The next steps involve demonstrating beamforming through two-dimensional arraying, expanding the communication distance by increasing the number of arrays, and developing receiving modules tailored to the usage application.
Eventually, Tokyo Tech and NTT aim to enable wireless communication with more than ten times the transmission capacity of conventional systems.

- News -

Intelliscale is CyrusOne’s first AI-branded deployment

CyrusOne’s latest AI-centered offering optimizes for space utilization by employing ultra-high-density server racks.

The new Intelliscale data center by CyrusOne offers a possible solution for companies aiming to scale their AI infrastructure. Intelliscale data centers can occupy just 25% of the space of typical data centers, depending on the application and needs.

According to John Hatem, COO of CyrusOne, “Deploying Intelliscale today will allow organizations to secure their AI future. Our objective is to establish an AI environment for our high-density customers that is efficient and flexible, empowering customers to enter the market more swiftly and cost-effectively.”

Some details

The new Intelliscale data center concept was designed from the ground up utilizing modular manufacturing and the company’s zero-water design.

Cooling is obviously critical here, a few features of the system include

• Liquid-to-chip

• Rear door heat exchanger systems

• Immersion cooling

The network infrastructure is also optimized with AI in mind, with high-speed interconnects throughout.

All of this is to achieve a reported 300kW per rack, which is unparalleled in the current market, though certainly won’t be for long. (Current average rack density is around 10kW.)

CyrusOne emphasizes that existing facilities can also be retrofitted to address dense AI deployments. In addition to space, there are additional converged infrastructure savings depending on their application.

We’ll likely see most, if not all, of the big data center companies release their “AI data centers” with density and speed claims aimed at enterprise AI needs.

- Big Deals -

It’s Google all right…

As we long suspected, Google has confirmed that it is behind the proposal filed for a data center in Lincoln, Nebraska. This new project puts Google Cloud investment in the area at $1.2 billion.

“We’re here. We’re here to stay, and we’re here to expand,” Allie Hopkins, Google’s head of data centers said. “It’s a message that Google is sending out to the nation that Nebraska is business-friendly.”

The planning permission documents indicate Google is planning to develop two million sq ft of data center space on 570 acres in Lancaster County, NE.

This is Google’s third data center project in the area.

- Big Deals -

Powerhouse is looking to build campus in Charlotte

The data center developer’s new campus will be located on a 130-acre site near a Duke Energy substation. According to DataCenterDynamics, the site could support up to 2.5 million square feet of computing space.

While the city council could be voting on the project next month, city staff are not sold. Questions about noise and environmental impact are outstanding.

PowerHouse was launched by American Real Estate Partners last year and has so far focused on data centers around Ashburn and Sterling VA.

Resources

Thanks a lot for reading!

Please let us know how we’re doing by replying directly to this email. And if you want to help grow this, share this with someone who loves data centers.

- Taylor