Vertiv engineers will engage in brainstorming, thought leadership sessions, and panels on the topics of next-generation data centers and the impact of AI on infrastructure
Vertiv (NYSE: VRT), a global provider of critical digital infrastructure and continuity solutions, is hosting its invitation-only Technology Fair for Vertiv engineers this week, an innovation event to encourage collaboration and creativity for future data centers, and to recognize and reward the efforts of the more than 400 attending Vertiv engineers that represent a subset of Vertiv’s larger global engineering team. This group includes many recent and repeat Vertiv patent holders. Previous Vertiv Technology Fair events have resulted in brainstorming on topics and ideas that led to process efficiency changes, design modifications, new products, and other business outcomes.
The three-day event, held in Columbus, Ohio, USA, at the Columbus Crew Major League Soccer club’s Lower.com Field, includes keynotes and interactive sessions with Vertiv CEO Giordano (Gio) Albertazzi, Chairman of the Board David M. Cote, and industry guest speakers. Select advanced technology partners will be on-hand to network with attendees and share their latest innovations. In addition to innovation sharing, Vertiv’s objectives for the event are to enable face-to-face collaboration across roles, geographies, and backgrounds to enable deeper understanding across the business; to identify trends that impact the industry and business; and to make progress on ideas that will result in technology advancement, including for artificial intelligence (AI).
“The Vertiv Technology Fair celebrates our commitment to innovation and employee growth during a critical time in our industry,” said Stephen Liang, chief technology officer at Vertiv. “We’re excited that our group of talented engineers has the daily opportunity to collaborate with so many industry leaders and chipmakers to develop reliable and energy-efficient infrastructure for current and future customer deployments.”
“As a long-time industry advocate and writer, it’s fascinating to meet the engineers behind the infrastructure and learn more about their processes and challenges,” said Bill Kleyman, guest panelist, and CEO and co-founder, Apolo. “The line-up of speakers and discussions hits the hottest topics that tech and the world at large are talking about. I hope that we all come away from this inspired and ready to make a difference.”
The event emphasizes that the engineering teams should embrace Vertiv’s AI Imperatives, not just for AI, but as an aspiration for all development work. Through in-depth customer interviews, extensive technical proofs-of-concept and technical collaboration with leading technology partners, Vertiv curated the list of key AI infrastructure imperatives that current and future designers, developers, and operators of AI factories share:
- Be Transformative: Operators are embarking on comprehensive changes in leveraging AI technology to transform their products, services and interactions with customers. This shift demands overhauls in operating models and infrastructure.
- Be First: To make quick progress in innovating products and customer experiences, it’s crucial to address the challenges of separate management of power and cooling systems. Overcoming these challenges can lead to a first mover advantage.
- Be Efficient: Efficient capital deployment is crucial for cost competitiveness while balancing AI’s processing power and environmental impact is essential for addressing these challenges known as the “AI efficiency paradox.”
- Be Confident: A meticulous plan is necessary to differentiate between calculated risks and reckless decisions. Understand these challenges to approach infrastructure innovation with confidence.
- Be Future-Ready: The past was about tech refresh and data center updates. The future is about infrastructure transformation to support densities in excess of 100kW per rack.
In addition to Kleyman, special guests will discuss the future of the data center and other topics. This year’s guests include:
- Christian Belady, advisor and board member for multiple tech companies, and former vice president & distinguished engineer for Microsoft
- Julie Albright, Ph.D., lecturer at the University of Southern California and leading expert in digital sociology
- Wade Vinson, chief data center distinguished engineer, NVIDIA
- Peter Gross, advisor and board member for multiple tech companies, and recent Data Center World Lifetime Achievement Award winner
The event will highlight also Vertiv’s recent industry partnerships to support the advancement of AI infrastructure, including a progress update and demonstration of its innovative cooling system developed in collaboration with NVIDIA for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy’s (ARPA-E) COOLERCHIPS awards program. Vertiv will also discuss its recent membership in the Liquid Cooling Coalition, an industry forum for advancing the adoption of liquid cooling to enable a sustainable future for data centers.
