The CEO of Sustainable Metal Cloud (SMC), an AI cloud provider headquartered in Singapore, announced on Thursday that the company intends to grow internationally in response to the rapidly increasing demand for its energy-saving technology.
CEO and co-founder Tim Rosenfield stated, “In response to client demand, we are aiming to expand into EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa) and North America.”
The startup, partnered with AI chip giant Nvidia, currently operates “sustainable AI factories” in Australia and Singapore and is now set to expand into India and Thailand.
In Singapore, more than 1,200 of Nvidia’s top-tier H100 AI chips are operated by it, and these chips power open-source models like Meta’s Llama 2.
While the majority of data centers rely on air cooling, SMC uses immersion technology, immersing Dell servers equipped with Nvidia GPUs in a synthetic oil known as polyalphaolefin to accelerate heat removal.
According to the CEO, the technology underlying the strategy uses up to 50% less energy than conventional air cooling.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) projects that by 2023, demand for AI will have increased tenfold.
According to an IEA report from March, data center power consumption is predicted to reach 1,000 terawatt-hours globally in 2026, which is almost equal to Japan’s yearly use.
According to a source with direct knowledge of the matter, SMC is raising $400 million in equity and $550 million in debt.
The company declined to comment, as the fund-raising was first reported by Bloomberg.
