AI GPU Cloud provider Nscale – operating a 60MW renewable energy-powered data centre in Norway and a pipeline of over 500MW of greenfield data centres in the US – has acquired Kontena, specialising in high-density modular data centres and AI Data Centre solutions. The acquisition is meant to give Nscale's the infrastructure backbone to the growing generative AI market through cost-effective, high-performance solutions that unlock AI's full potential.
Jef Laurijssen, CEO of Kontena, said: “Joining forces with Nscale provides us with an incredible opportunity to accelerate the development and deployment of cutting-edge Generative AI Data Centre solutions. Our combined expertise will enable us to deliver unparalleled value to our customers in the AI and HPC markets.” Founded in 2018, Antwerp-based Kontena specialises in high-density data centres and HPC solutions, combining innovation with practicality. The company recently collaborated with ElioVP and Bluesio to develop better and more innovative AI and HPC solutions.
EDGE data room
Capitalising on Kontena’s innovative KONNECT ecosystem, combined with Nscale’s extensive infrastructure capabilities, the two companies will deliver high-performance solutions. Kontena's flagship product, the EDGE data room, is a fully modular Generative AI data Centre solution designed to meet the complex demands of advancing AI development. The EDGE data room is one of the world’s first modular solution deploying AI infrastructure on-premises and in remote locations, far quicker and at lower cost than traditional Tier 3 Data Centres.
Nscale officially launched in May 2024. The company offers a GPU cloud based on AMD hardware, specifically AMD's Instinct M1300X accelerators. Nscale is a fully vertically integrated AI GPU Cloud provider delivering compute to the generative AI market at scale. The company is one of the several crypto companies to have at least partially moved workloads to AI.
Bespoke GPU clusters
Joshua Payne, CEO of Nscale, commented: “The acquisition of Kontena allows Nscale to design, build, and deploy bespoke GPU clusters at scale for global Generative AI customers more quickly and more cost-effectively than the competition. Building Kontena into the Nscale value chain will allow us to deliver bespoke GPU superclusters and data centre builds for our large supercluster and hyperscale customers across Nscale’s 500MW of greenfield data centre capacity. This modular system can be deployed in Nscale’s data centres, on-premise, or at the edge to deliver unrivalled speed, performance, and efficiency on GenAI workloads. This is an important step towards our goal of vertical integration.”
The acquisition follows Nscale’s recent announcement of a strategic partnership with Open Innovation AI, a leading GPU orchestration platform in MENA, targeting the deployment of 30,000 GPUs over the next 3 years, further solidifying its commitment to AI infrastructure and optimised workloads for global markets.
