As the artificial intelligence (AI) data center market undergoes explosive growth, “thermal management” has emerged as a core technology determining the competitiveness of AI infrastructure. From semiconductors and cooling systems to power equipment and oil refining, industries across the board are going all-in on heat management technology development.<\/p>\n
According to market research firm Fortune Business Insights, the global thermal management systems market is projected to grow from $819.7 billion in 2025 at a compound annual growth rate of 8.5%, expanding to $1.694 trillion by 2034. AI data center facility investment is also estimated to have surged from $750 billion last year to $1 trillion this year.<\/p>\n
“Data center cooling methods are divided into air cooling, liquid cooling, and immersion cooling,” an industry insider said. “Among these, immersion cooling is drawing attention as the next-generation cooling technology.” The source added, “Improving cooling efficiency is essential for enhancing power usage effectiveness (PUE), and related technology development is underway in South Korea, including efforts to develop immersion cooling solutions.”<\/p>\n
Semiconductors Tackle Heat at the Design Stage: Samsung and SK Hynix Clash on Next-Gen Tech<\/p>\n
In the semiconductor industry, thermal management has become central to the next-generation memory competition. High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), the core of AI semiconductors, features a structure where DRAM chips are stacked in multiple layers. As the number of layers increases, technology to effectively dissipate heat becomes increasingly critical.<\/p>\n
Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) recently unveiled “zHBM,” a next-generation 3D memory technology. zHBM vertically stacks memory directly on top of AI accelerators, reducing data travel distance to achieve up to eight times the system performance and up to three times the power efficiency compared to existing HBM. Notably, it is expected to contribute to solving heat issues by reducing thermal resistance by half.<\/p>\n
Samsung also presented a high-performance NAND solution called “zNAND-O.” Combining V-NAND stacking technology with through-silicon vias (TSV), it stacks NAND chips in four or eight layers, targeting the on-device and edge AI markets.<\/p>\n
SK Hynix (000660.KS) also showcased HBF (High Bandwidth Flash), a next-generation memory technology, positioning thermal management as a key competitive advantage. The company is continuously advancing heat dissipation materials and packaging technologies in the development of HBM4 and HBM4E. SK Hynix, together with SanDisk, announced the first open HBF standard specification, moving to expand the ecosystem.<\/p>\n
Both companies unveiled a slew of next-generation memory technologies at “FMS 2026” held last week in Santa Clara, California. The technology that drew the most attention was CXL (Compute Express Link), considered the next-generation HBM. CXL is a technology that organically connects CPUs, GPUs, and memory to expand bandwidth and capacity limits.<\/p>\n
Samsung Electronics presented results from CXL memory pooling-based KV cache offloading experiments, demonstrating the potential of large-capacity memory pooling technology. SK Hynix, in collaboration with Marvell, unveiled “CMM-Ax,” a CXL-based Processing-Near-Memory (PNM) memory module, claiming it achieved up to 5.5 times higher throughput compared to a single GPU in ultra-long-context LLM environments.<\/p>\n
PIM (Processing-In-Memory) technology, where memory also performs computations, is another area where both companies are investing heavily. Samsung Electronics won the “FMS Best of Show Award” for its LPDDR5X-PIM, the world’s first of its kind, while SK Hynix introduced its LPDDR6-PIM development roadmap. This technology targets the edge AI market\u2014such as on-device AI that does not rely on central cloud processing\u2014offering the advantage of running high-performance AI with low power consumption.<\/p>\n
LG Electronics Secures \u20a9600 Billion in Orders in First Half Alone, Targets Cooling Solution Market<\/p>\n
LG Electronics (066570.KS) is cultivating its cooling business as a future growth engine in the AI era. AI data center cooling solutions are one of the core areas of LG Electronics’ B2B business. Building on its existing commercial HVAC business, the company is advancing chillers, cooling water systems, and air conditioning equipment to target the global data center market.<\/p>\n
“Orders related to AI data center cooling solutions reached \u20a9600 billion (approximately $426.3 million) in the first half of this year,” said Park Kang-ho, an analyst at Daishin Securities. “If additional orders worth trillions of won proceed as indicated by LG Electronics, the profitability of the Eco Solution (ES) division is expected to expand in 2027.”<\/p>\n
AI data centers have relatively higher power density than general servers, making heat control difficult with conventional air cooling alone. LG Electronics is expanding comprehensive cooling solutions combining high-efficiency chillers and liquid cooling technologies, entering the North American and European markets.<\/p>\n
Power Equipment and Oil Refining Industries Join the Fray: Immersion Cooling in Focus<\/p>\n
As thermal management technology emerges as a new competitive frontier, power equipment companies and the oil refining industry are also accelerating technology development in the cooling sector.<\/p>\n
LS Electric and Hyosung Heavy Industries are expanding their power supply equipment and ultra-high-voltage transformer businesses for data centers while focusing on developing high-efficiency power devices that reduce heat generation and enhance cooling performance.<\/p>\n
SK Enmove is cultivating cooling fluids specifically for immersion cooling as a future growth business. Immersion cooling is a method where servers are directly submerged in a special non-conductive insulating coolant to remove heat. It offers higher cooling efficiency and lower power consumption than conventional air cooling, drawing attention as the next-generation cooling technology for AI data centers.<\/p>\n
The oil refining industry is also eyeing the growth potential of the thermal management fluids market. HD Hyundai Oilbank is demonstrating its “Xteer E-Cooling Fluid” in collaboration with Seoul National University’s AI Data Center and the Korea Institute of Ceramic Engineering and Technology. S-Oil’s immersion cooling fluid, “e-Cooling Solution,” is a thermal management solution applicable to high-heat environments including data centers, energy storage systems (ESS), and electric vehicle (EV) batteries. The company plans to conduct verification tests with institutions such as Sungkyunkwan University’s Supercomputing Center.<\/p>\n
Nvidia Considers Rubin Ultra Spec Adjustment Amid HBM Supply Shortage<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Nvidia, which dominates the AI semiconductor market, is reportedly considering a downward adjustment of the HBM memory configuration for its next-generation “Rubin Ultra” GPU. This is interpreted as a measure to cope with the shortage of high-performance HBM supply.<\/p>\n
According to market research firm TrendForce, the DRAM supply shortage is expected to persist through 2027. While HBM bit shipments are projected to increase 50-60% year-over-year in 2027, they are still expected to fall short of demand. SK Hynix has publicly stated that its HBM, DRAM, and NAND production capacity for 2026 is completely sold out, and Samsung Electronics has also warned that the memory shortage will continue into 2027.<\/p>\n
If Nvidia lowers HBM specifications, customers may need to deploy more GPUs to handle AI workloads such as large language model (LLM) inference. This could lead to increased data center construction costs for major cloud operators expanding AI infrastructure investments, including Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, and Google.<\/p>\n
However, the industry interprets Nvidia’s move as a symbolic event demonstrating that the “memory wall” is materializing as a key bottleneck for AI expansion. It reflects the reality that while AI computing demand is exploding, HBM supply is constrained by the pace of physical production capacity expansion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the artificial intelligence (AI) data center market undergoes explosive growth, “thermal management” has emerged as a core…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":112577,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[544,40141,55626,699,8796,678,39053,357,1549,2295,8795,127,276,6260,275],"class_list":["post-112576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-samsung-electronics","tag-ai-data-center","tag-cxl","tag-fms-2026","tag-hbm","tag-hd-hyundai-oilbank","tag-hyosung-heavy-industries","tag-immersion-cooling","tag-lg-electronics","tag-ls-electric","tag-nvidia","tag-s-oil","tag-samsung","tag-samsung-electronics","tag-sk-enmove","tag-sk-hynix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112576"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112576\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112577"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}