Equinix & Liquid Cooling: How AI is Driving a 2025 Data Center Revolution

Industry Adoption: Equinix’s Strategic Pivot to Liquid Cooling for the AI Era

Between 2021 and 2024, Equinix laid the strategic groundwork for a fundamental infrastructure shift, moving liquid cooling from an experimental technology to a core business imperative. The period was characterized by testing, validation, and building the business case. The 2022 establishment of the Co-Innovation Facility (CIF) in Ashburn, Virginia, became the epicenter for this effort, where Equinix began piloting advanced solutions like ZutaCore’s direct-on-chip, two-phase cooling. The company also initiated key hardware partnerships, notably qualifying NVIDIA’s A100 liquid-cooled GPUs to ensure its platform could support the emerging class of AI accelerators. The inflection point arrived in late 2023 with a landmark announcement: a full-scale commercial commitment to roll out support for direct-to-chip and other advanced liquid cooling technologies across more than 100 of its global data centers. This decision marked a definitive pivot, recognizing that traditional air cooling was insufficient for the high-density computing workloads driven by AI and HPC.

From 2025 onwards, Equinix transitioned from strategic planning to aggressive, large-scale execution. The narrative shifted from “if” to “how and where,” with liquid cooling becoming a standard, customer-facing offering. This is evidenced by high-profile commercial projects, such as hosting a liquid-cooled HPC for Merck KGaA in Munich and a pilot in Hong Kong with Dell and Schneider Electric delivering a staggering 150kW of cooling per rack—30 times more than conventional air cooling. The problem Equinix is solving is stark: AI workloads have pushed rack power densities from a historical 5-10 kW to over 100 kW. The company’s CIF has become an assembly line for market-ready solutions, with partners like Flex, JetCool, and Accelsius deploying and proving their technologies in a live environment. This variety of deployments—from two-phase direct-to-chip systems to more water-efficient single-phase solutions—demonstrates that liquid cooling is no longer a monolithic concept but a diverse and mature toolkit. Equinix is now positioned not just as a colocation provider but as a specialized infrastructure partner capable of handling the most demanding AI deployments, creating a significant moat in the high-value AI infrastructure market.

Table: Equinix’s Strategic Investments in Liquid Cooling Infrastructure

Table: Equinix’s Ecosystem of Liquid Cooling Partners

Geography: Equinix’s Global Liquid Cooling Deployment

Between 2021 and 2024, Equinix’s liquid cooling activities were concentrated in innovation hubs. Ashburn, Virginia, home to its Co-Innovation Facility (CIF), served as the primary testbed for validating technologies with partners like ZutaCore. The strategy then materialized into concrete investment plans in key Asia-Pacific markets, with liquid-cooling-ready data centers announced for Singapore (SG6), Hong Kong (HK6), Australia, and Osaka, Japan (OS4). This initial phase focused on establishing beachheads in major digital economies. The period culminated with the late 2023 announcement of a global rollout plan targeting over 45 metropolitan areas, signaling a shift from targeted builds to a worldwide strategy, though the physical deployment was still nascent.

From 2025, the geographic strategy has visibly shifted from planning to widespread, tangible execution. The map of activity has diversified significantly, demonstrating that liquid cooling is becoming mainstream across multiple continents. Europe is a key focus, with a massive £3.9 billion investment in the UK and a high-profile commercial deployment for Merck in Munich, Germany. In Asia, the strategy is bearing fruit with the opening of CN1, the first “AI-ready” data center in Chennai, India, and a high-performance pilot in Hong Kong. Perhaps most telling of the strategy’s maturation is the expansion into emerging markets, with Equinix making its Chile data center the first in the country to be liquid-cooling ready. This geographic broadening from a few core innovation centers to a globally distributed network of enabled facilities in North America, Europe, Asia, and Latin America shows Equinix is aggressively moving to capture regional AI demand wherever it emerges.

Technology Maturity: Equinix’s Journey from Pilot to Scaled Commercial Product

In the 2021–2024 period, Equinix’s focus was on technology validation and de-risking. The journey began in a lab-like setting at the CIF, where technologies such as ZutaCore’s two-phase direct-on-chip cooling were tested. The goal was to prove feasibility and operational viability for systems capable of handling over 100 kW per rack. A critical milestone occurred in February 2023, when Equinix moved two-phase cooling from the lab into live production on its Equinix Metal service. This was a crucial validation point, demonstrating that the technology was mature enough for real-world commercial workloads. The period ended with a clear technological roadmap, with Equinix committing to a vendor-agnostic commercial rollout supporting both direct-to-chip (DLC) and rear-door heat exchanger solutions, effectively graduating liquid cooling from R&D to a core service offering.

The period from 2025 to the present marks the era of commercial scaling and specialization. Liquid cooling is no longer a future-looking technology but a deployed, revenue-generating product. The maturity is evident in the specificity and performance of the deployments. For example, the Hong Kong pilot with Dell and Schneider Electric is not just a demo but a high-performance system specified to cool 150kW per rack. The CIF now functions as a partner showcase, rapidly validating and onboarding diverse technologies like Accelsius’s NeuCool™ two-phase system and Flex/JetCool’s water-efficient single-phase DLC. The technology has matured to the point of productization. The launch of the “AI-ready” CN1 data center in Chennai and the development of a custom In-Row Heat Exchanger (IRHX) for AWS’s Blackwell GPUs show that liquid cooling has evolved from a one-size-fits-all concept to a standardized, yet highly customizable, commercial solution integral to Equinix’s business.

Table: SWOT Analysis of Equinix’s Liquid Cooling Strategy

Forward-Looking Insights and Summary

The most recent data from 2025 signals that Equinix has decisively moved past the experimental phase of liquid cooling and is now focused on commercial domination and operational excellence. The year ahead will be defined by three key trends that market actors must watch. First, expect the standardization of “AI-ready” infrastructure to accelerate. The launch of purpose-built facilities like CN1 in Chennai is a template, suggesting liquid cooling will transition from a custom add-on to a standard, line-item offering in new builds, simplifying adoption for enterprises.

Second, the Co-Innovation Facility (CIF) has proven its value as an accelerator. The rapid deployment and validation of solutions from partners like Accelsius and Flex indicate a robust pipeline of innovation. Market actors should watch for a broadening of this partner ecosystem, as Equinix builds a vetted “menu” of best-in-class cooling options to lock in customers by offering maximum choice and flexibility. Finally, the most critical signal is that the bottleneck is shifting from cooling to power. Equinix’s exploration of nuclear power via its backing of Oklo is not a side project; it is a direct response to the immense energy appetite of liquid-cooled, high-density AI racks. We should expect to see more aggressive moves to secure large-scale, clean, and reliable power through novel Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs). In summary, Equinix has successfully de-risked the technology. The race is no longer about proving liquid cooling works; it’s about executing a global deployment at speed and securing the power to fuel the AI revolution it enables.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is liquid cooling suddenly so important for Equinix?
Traditional air cooling is no longer sufficient to handle the demands of modern AI and High-Performance Computing (HPC) workloads. These workloads have dramatically increased rack power densities from a historical 5-10 kW to over 100 kW, and in some cases up to 150 kW, creating a thermal challenge that only advanced liquid cooling can solve.

Is Equinix using a single type of liquid cooling technology?
No, Equinix is building a diverse and mature toolkit rather than relying on a single solution. The company supports various technologies through its partner ecosystem, including two-phase direct-to-chip systems (from partners like ZutaCore and Accelsius), water-efficient single-phase direct liquid cooling (from Flex and JetCool), and custom solutions like in-row heat exchangers for specific clients like AWS.

How has Equinix’s strategy for liquid cooling changed over time?
Between 2021 and 2024, the strategy focused on testing and validation, treating liquid cooling as an experimental technology within its Co-Innovation Facility (CIF). From 2025 onwards, the strategy shifted to aggressive, large-scale execution. Liquid cooling is no longer in R&D but has become a standard, customer-facing offering being rolled out across more than 100 global data centers.

Where is Equinix deploying these liquid cooling solutions?
Equinix is undertaking a global deployment. While initial activities were centered in innovation hubs like Ashburn, Virginia, the rollout now spans multiple continents. The company has announced major investments and deployments in the UK, Germany, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, Japan, India, and even emerging markets like Chile, demonstrating a widespread, global execution strategy.

Now that the technology is proven, what is the next major challenge for Equinix’s AI infrastructure strategy?
The primary bottleneck is shifting from cooling technology to power availability. The article’s forward-looking analysis indicates that the immense energy appetite of liquid-cooled, high-density AI racks is the most critical challenge. Equinix’s exploration of new power sources, such as its partnership with nuclear company Oklo, highlights that securing large-scale, clean, and reliable power is the next major hurdle to fuel the AI revolution.