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AI Boom, Hunger for Cooling Specialists – What Shook the Data Center Industry This Week
The second quarter of 2026 delivered numbers to the data center industry that would have seemed abstract just a year ago, and the job market shows that transforming infrastructure for AI now demands not just capital, but concrete expertise. We look at two signals that best capture the pace of change: a sharp rise in capital expenditure and integrators' race to hire liquid cooling experts.
01 · AI Investment
Data Center Investment Is Growing at a Pace That Surprised Even Analysts [1]
According to the latest data from Dell'Oro Group, spending on data center infrastructure surged by as much as 92% year over year in Q2 2026 [1]. This is the result of a wave of Nvidia Blackwell Ultra accelerator deployments and growing demand for compute power to support agentic AI workloads — systems that don't just respond to queries, but independently plan and execute multi-step tasks. The pressure on hardware is also visible in pricing: GPU-equipped servers became 43.6% more expensive year over year.
Interestingly, Dell'Oro didn't just summarize the past quarter — it also raised its long-term forecast. The firm now estimates that global data center capital expenditure will exceed $3 trillion by 2030, nearly double what was projected just a short while ago. For operators, integrators, and infrastructure providers in our region, this is a signal that the investment wave is only just gathering momentum, and demand for new compute capacity, server room space, and accompanying power infrastructure will keep growing in the years ahead.
02 · Liquid Cooling
Who Will Service This Infrastructure? Integrators Bet on Liquid Cooling [2]
With compute power climbing this fast, someone has to design, build, and maintain that infrastructure — which brings us to the second major story of the week. British integrator Datalec Precision Installations announced the hiring of Dominik Dziarczykowski as its liquid cooling expert [2]. His role will be to develop high-power-density solutions dedicated to AI and HPC workloads — precisely the ones driving the investment boom described above.
This is no isolated case. Installation and integration firms across the industry are rapidly building liquid cooling expertise in response to growing hyperscaler demand for direct-to-chip cooling. Servers equipped with accelerators like Blackwell Ultra generate far more heat than classic CPU setups, and traditional air cooling simply can't keep up at such high power densities. The job market is reacting fast: expertise in designing and deploying liquid cooling systems is becoming one of the most sought-after specializations in the industry, and companies that build this capability fastest stand to gain a real competitive edge in serving the next wave of AI projects.
Summary
Summary
The picture that emerges from this week is consistent: capital is flowing into data centers faster than ever, and with it comes rising demand for specialists who can physically build and cool that infrastructure. It's precisely at the intersection of these two trends — investment and expertise — that we'll see who stands to gain the most from the current AI boom.
Want to see live the solutions addressing these challenges – from the latest liquid cooling systems to power infrastructure for high-density workloads? Join us at DATA CENTER Expo Poland – Targi Technologii i Infrastruktury dla Branży Data Center, where you'll meet the integrators, vendors, and experts shaping the future of this industry.
Invitation
See firsthand the solutions driving today's data center investment boom – from liquid cooling systems to infrastructure for the highest-density AI workloads. DATA CENTER Expo Poland is where integrators, technology providers, and operators share their knowledge on building tomorrow's infrastructure. Find out how to prepare your company for the next wave of compute investment.
DATA CENTER Expo Poland 2026Footnotes
[1] CRN.pl — https://crn.pl/aktualnosci/inwestycje-w-centra-danych-wzrosly-o-92-proc-w-ii-kw-2026-roku[2] GlobeNewswire — https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2026/09/28/3369537/0/en/datalec-strengthens-its-liquid-cooling-capabilities-with-the-appointment-of-dominik-dziarczykowski.html