Data Center Infrastructure Market Surges 28% on AI Cooling Demand

While AI compute demand remains the primary engine for infrastructure investment, the physical buildout now faces significant headwinds. Alex Cordovil, research director at Dell'Oro Group, pointed to power access and emerging permitting hurdles as critical bottlenecks. In the United States, community opposition and complex project timelines are increasingly complicating the deployment of giga-scale facilities, forcing developers to contend with shifting compute architectures.

Thermal management has emerged as the most aggressive segment, growing nearly 50 percent as Direct Liquid Cooling becomes standard for high-density environments. This trend is mirrored by a surge in M&A activity, with major players like Vertiv, Legrand, and Ecolab aggressively acquiring specialized cooling and structural firms to secure their supply chains. Despite these logistical challenges and project delays, the industry maintains a positive outlook, with order backlogs suggesting the current growth trajectory will likely persist into early 2027.