Infineon and NVIDIA work on 800V power delivery for servers
Infineon, in collaboration with NVIDIA, is developing the next generation of power systems based on a new architecture with central power generation of 800 V high-voltage direct current (HVDC).
The new system architecture is said to significantly increases energy-efficient power distribution across the data centre and to allow power conversion directly at the AI chip (Graphic Processing Unit, GPU) within the server board. The company says it will be using its expertise in a number of power semiconductor materials including silicon, SiC and GaN.
As AI data centres already are going beyond 100,000 individual GPUs, the need for more efficient power delivery is becoming increasingly important. AI data centrs will require power outputs of one megawatt (MW) and more per IT rack before the end of the decade. Therefore, the HVDC architecture coupled with high-density multiphase solutions will set a new standard for the industry, driving the development of high-quality components and power distribution systems.
"The new 800V HVDC system architecture delivers high reliability, energy-efficient power distribution across the data centre,” said Gabriele Gorla, vice president of system engineering at NVIDIA. “Through this innovative approach, NVIDIA is able to optimise the energy consumption of our advanced AI infrastructure, which supports our commitment to sustainability while also delivering the performance and scalability required for the next generation of AI workloads.”
At present, the power supply in AI data centres is decentralised. This means that the AI chips are supplied with power by a large number of power supply units (PSU). The future system architecture will be centralised, making the best possible use of the constraint space in a server rack. This will increase the importance of leading-edge power semiconductor solutions using fewest power conversion stages and allowing upgrades to even higher distribution voltages.
