On October 17, Schneider Electric announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire a controlling stake in Motivair Corp, a specialist in liquid cooling and advanced thermal management solutions for high-performance computing systems, to enhance its services to fast-growing data centers.
Under the terms of the transaction, Schneider Electric will acquire an initial controlling stake of 75% in Motivair for an all-cash consideration of $850 million, with plans to acquire the remaining shares by 2028. Subject to the required regulatory approvals, the transaction is expected to close in the coming quarters. Upon completion, Motivair will be integrated into Schneider Electric’s energy management business.
Founded in 1988, Motivair is headquartered in Buffalo, New York and currently employs more than 150 people. With strong engineering capabilities and deep domain expertise, Motivair offers a top product portfolio that includes coolant dispensers (CDU), backdoor heat exchanger (RDHx), cold plate and cooling units (HDU), and coolers for thermal management to help customers meet the heat dissipation challenges of modern computing technology.
In recent years, the emergence of generative artificial intelligence and the boom in large-scale language models have driven a huge demand for higher performance processors. This shift to accelerated computing has led to new data center architectures requiring more efficient cooling solutions, especially liquid cooling, as traditional air cooling alone cannot mitigate the resulting higher heat. Several market and analyst organizations predict that the compound annual growth rate of liquid cooling solutions will exceed 30% in the next few years. The transaction strengthens Schneider Electric’s portfolio of direct chip liquid cooling and high-volume cooling solutions, enhancing existing products and driving innovation in cooling technology.
While liquid cooling is not a new technology, specific applications in data centers and AI environments represent an emerging market and will see strong growth in the coming years. Motivair has years of unparalleled experience in using liquid cooling solutions to cool the world’s fastest supercomputers. The company has been enjoying strong double-digit growth in recent quarters and expects that to continue as the company shifts to providing end-to-end liquid cooling solutions for several of its largest data center and artificial intelligence customers.
Commenting on the acquisition, Peter Herweck, CEO of Schneider Electric, said: “The acquisition of Motivair is an important step for us, further solidifying our global leadership position across the entire data center value chain. Motivair’s unique liquid cooling portfolio complements our value proposition in data center cooling, solidifying our prominent position in the data center build process from grid to chip and from chip to cooler. ”
Motivair President and CEO Rich Whitmore said, “Schneider Electric is aligned with our core values of innovation, sustainability and excellence. Joining forces with Schneider Electric will allow us to further scale our operations and invest in new technologies that will drive our mission forward and solidify our position as an industry leader.”
Schneider Electric’s sales in the data center market have maintained a double-digit compound annual growth rate since 2017, and the data center and network end market accounted for 21% of the group’s orders in fiscal year 2023. The top 10 global cloud computing and service providers rely on Schneider Electric’s solutions, while four out of six data center companies rely on Schneider Electric’s sustainability consulting and services.
