SLB’s Geothermal Pivot: Powering the 2025 Data Center Boom

Industry Adoption: How SLB is Tapping Subsurface Expertise for Geothermal Energy

Between 2021 and 2024, SLB laid the digital groundwork for a major strategic transformation. The period was defined by foundational partnerships with technology giants like Microsoft, AWS, and NVIDIA, aimed at building a robust, cloud-native digital ecosystem for the energy industry. The commercial release of the SLB Enterprise Data Solution with Microsoft in 2022 and collaborations to accelerate the OSDU® Data Platform were not just about optimizing oil and gas operations; they were about creating a scalable, data-driven platform capable of managing complex subsurface information for any application. This phase was characterized by building the digital tools—AI, cloud infrastructure, and data management—to prove SLB’s capability as a high-tech software and services provider, yielding significant internal efficiencies, such as the $18-45 million in annual savings achieved through its partnership with Dataiku.

The inflection point arrived in 2025. With its digital foundation firmly in place, SLB executed a decisive pivot, applying its technology stack to the burgeoning data center market, with geothermal energy as a key enabler. The explosive growth of AI has created unprecedented demand for power, pushing data centers to seek clean, reliable, baseload energy sources. SLB’s 2025 activities reflect a direct response to this demand. The strategic partnership with geothermal leader Ormat Technologies to co-develop Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) and the collaboration with Google Cloud and Project Innerspace to accelerate global geothermal adoption are explicit moves to power this new industry. This pivot was validated by significant commercial traction: SLB’s Data Center Solutions revenue reached $331 million in the first nine months of 2025, and the company became fully qualified to provide geothermal solutions to the U.S. Department of Defense. This shift from building digital tools to deploying integrated energy solutions marks the mainstreaming of SLB’s strategy to become a critical infrastructure provider for the digital age.

Table: SLB Strategic Investments in Enabling Technologies

Table: SLB’s Key Geothermal and Digital Enablement Partnerships

Geographic Expansion: SLB’s Global Geothermal Footprint

Between 2021 and 2024, SLB’s geographic activity was centered on solidifying its digital presence in major global energy hubs. Partnerships with Aker BP in Norway, TotalEnergies in France, and the cross-regional collaborations with Microsoft and AWS established a worldwide digital infrastructure. A significant domestic move during this period was the landmark decision in late 2023 to convert a former General Motors plant in Shreveport, Louisiana, into a manufacturing facility for data center components. This signaled a strategic onshoring of a new hardware supply chain within the United States, positioning SLB to directly serve the North American data center market.

From 2025 onwards, the geographic focus has become more targeted and application-specific. The United States has emerged as a primary theater for SLB’s geothermal ambitions. The partnership with Ormat Technologies involves a pilot EGS project at an existing Ormat site, likely in a geothermal-rich western state. Furthermore, achieving full qualification to provide geothermal solutions to the U.S. Department of Defense in April 2025 gives SLB a license to operate on U.S. military installations globally, a significant and geographically diverse market. While collaborations with Google Cloud and Star Energy Geothermal are global in scope, the initial commercial and pilot activities are heavily concentrated in the U.S., which serves as the key validation ground for SLB’s integrated geothermal and data center strategy.

Technology Maturity: From Digital Platforms to Integrated Energy Systems

The 2021–2024 period was defined by the maturation and commercial scaling of SLB’s *enabling digital technologies*. The launch of the SLB Enterprise Data Solution with Microsoft in 2022 was not a pilot but a full commercial release, establishing a scalable, cloud-native platform for managing vast subsurface data. Investments in and partnerships with AI firms like Geminus AI and Dataiku moved artificial intelligence from a conceptual tool to a commercially integrated component of SLB’s workflows, delivering measurable financial returns. The technology focus was on creating a proven, enterprise-grade software and data management backbone that could be sold to traditional energy clients while simultaneously being repurposed for future ventures.

In 2025, the technology focus pivoted from the digital platform itself to its *application in a new energy vertical*. The maturity shifted from commercial software to pre-commercial and pilot-stage integrated systems. The partnership with Ormat is explicitly for co-development and a pilot EGS project, which moves SLB’s role from software provider to a hands-on developer of next-generation physical energy assets. While the underlying digital tools are mature, their application to EGS is in the validation phase. However, the qualification to provide geothermal solutions to the DoD indicates that SLB’s conventional geothermal offerings are already considered commercially viable and ready for deployment at scale. The current technology trajectory shows a clear path: leveraging a mature digital core to de-risk and accelerate the commercialization of emerging clean energy hardware like EGS.

Table: SWOT Analysis of SLB’s Geothermal and Data Center Strategy

Forward-Looking Insights and Summary

The data from 2025 signals that SLB’s pivot is past the conceptual stage and is now in full execution. The year ahead will be critical for validating the scalability and profitability of this strategy. Market actors should closely monitor the progress of the EGS pilot project with Ormat Technologies; its success or failure will be a key technical and commercial indicator for the future of next-generation geothermal in SLB’s portfolio. Another crucial signal to watch for is the announcement of a large-scale project with a hyperscale data center operator. Securing a flagship contract with a major cloud provider would serve as the ultimate market validation, cementing SLB’s role as a critical enabler of AI infrastructure.

The financial performance of the New Energy division, particularly its data center and geothermal components, will be under intense scrutiny. Achieving the stated goal of over $1 billion in 2025 revenue for the combined New Energy segments is a key milestone. Traction is clearly gaining in the integrated offering—providing not just modular data center hardware but also the clean power to run it. The most powerful trend to watch is this convergence. Any project that combines SLB’s Shreveport-manufactured hardware with power from a new SLB-developed geothermal asset will represent the full realization of this ambitious, forward-looking strategy, positioning the company as one of the most compelling industrial transformation stories in the market.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is SLB, a company known for oil and gas, suddenly focusing on geothermal energy and data centers?
SLB is responding to the massive power demand created by the AI and data center boom. Data centers require clean, reliable, 24/7 (baseload) energy, which geothermal power can provide. SLB is leveraging its decades of subsurface expertise, originally developed for oil and gas, to tap into this new, high-growth market and position itself as a key infrastructure provider for the digital age.

What was the purpose of SLB’s digital partnerships with companies like Microsoft and NVIDIA before 2025?
Between 2021 and 2024, SLB’s partnerships with tech giants like Microsoft, NVIDIA, and AWS were focused on building a foundational digital ecosystem. The goal was to create a scalable, cloud-native platform (like the SLB Enterprise Data Solution) capable of managing complex subsurface data. This built the technical backbone and proved SLB’s high-tech capabilities, which it is now applying to new energy ventures like geothermal.

Is SLB’s new strategy actually working? Is there any proof of success?
Yes, the article points to significant commercial traction in 2025. SLB’s Data Center Solutions business generated $331 million in revenue in the first nine months of the year. Furthermore, the company became fully qualified to provide geothermal solutions to the U.S. Department of Defense, validating its technical offerings for a major client. Its New Energy division is targeting over $1 billion in revenue for 2025.

What is the significance of the partnership with Ormat Technologies?
The partnership with geothermal leader Ormat Technologies is a key part of SLB’s execution phase. It allows SLB to co-develop next-generation Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) and integrated geothermal assets. This collaboration moves SLB from being just a software and services provider to a hands-on developer of physical energy assets, directly targeting the data center market with a clean, baseload power solution.

How is SLB involved in the physical data center hardware market?
SLB made a significant move into the hardware market in late 2023 by leasing a 1 million sq. ft. former GM plant in Shreveport, Louisiana. The facility is being converted to manufacture digital infrastructure components, including server rack infrastructure and cooling systems for data centers. This allows SLB to offer an integrated solution: not just the clean energy to power data centers, but also the physical hardware for the centers themselves.