Akash Systems Delivers Diamond-Cooled GPU Servers
Akash Systems announced the delivery of the first-ever NVIDIA GPU servers featuring its Akash Diamond Cooling® technology to NxtGen AI Pvt Ltd. The company claims its solution is additive to existing air and liquid cooling methods and can increase GPU compute performance by approximately 15% in high ambient temperature data centers. The technology is designed to enable throttle-free performance for demanding AI workloads.
- The technology is based on co-founder Felix Ejeckam's invention of Gallium Nitride (GaN)-on-Diamond, a composite material originally developed for hyper-efficient satellite communications systems. Akash Systems was founded in 2016 to commercialize this material, which places synthetic diamond within nanometers of a semiconductor's hottest region to rapidly extract heat. - Synthetic diamond is the world's most thermally conductive material, transferring heat about five times more effectively than copper. This allows the cooling system to reduce GPU hotspot temperatures by 10°-20°C, even in servers that are already liquid-cooled. - The deal with NxtGen is a $27 million contract to roll out the diamond-cooled servers across NxtGen's data centers in India. NxtGen, a major Indian cloud provider, aims to use the technology to double performance-per-watt and cut AI compute service costs by more than 50%. - Beyond performance gains, the cooling technology is claimed to enable up to 25% overclocking capabilities, double server lifetimes, and reduce GPU fan energy consumption by 90% by decreasing fan speeds by half. - Thermal throttling is a protective mechanism in GPUs that automatically lowers clock speeds and voltage to prevent damage from excessive heat, which can slow down demanding AI training and high-performance computing tasks. - Akash Systems recently received a proposed $18.2 million in direct funding from the U.S. CHIPS and Science Act to help build a $121 million, 40,000-square-foot semiconductor manufacturing facility in West Oakland, California. - The company has previously raised $17.6 million in venture capital, including a $3.1 million seed round in 2018 and a $14.5 million Series A in 2019, with investors including Khosla Ventures and Founders Fund.
