Dell’Oro Group forecasts data center physical infrastructure revenue to reach $120 billion by 2030

A Dell’Oro Group forecast projects worldwide data center physical infrastructure manufacturer revenue to reach $120 billion by 2030, growing at a 22% CAGR from 2025. The report attributes most of the growth to net additions of installed IT capacity and expects delivery constraints to become the main risk.

Market outlook and revenue forecast

Dell’Oro Group projects DCPI manufacturer revenue to grow at a 22% compound annual growth rate from 2025 to 2030, reaching $120 billion by the end of the period. The report states that net additions to installed IT capacity account for most of the forecast.

The forecast also notes that infrastructure content per megawatt will have a smaller effect as higher-density and liquid-cooled architectures redistribute spend across DCPI categories.

What changes in the forecast

Alex Cordovil, Research Director at Dell’Oro Group, said, “The AI buildout has moved past the point where it can be treated as a surge. It is now the baseline against which the rest of the market is measured.”

Cordovil added, “What has changed in this forecast is where the risk sits. Demand is no longer the open question—delivery is. Equipment lead times, construction labor, grid interconnection, and community consent all remain constrained, especially with the first statewide data center moratorium now in force.”

Capacity additions and regional patterns

The report says annual net capacity additions peak in 2026 on a year-over-year growth basis, then moderate steadily while staying in double-digit growth through 2030. It also states that North America leads capacity additions over the period, followed by China.

Dell’Oro Group reports that North America continues to lead regional growth, with China the next largest contributor. It also says EMEA is the only region revised downward from the January forecast due to slower power availability and a more difficult permitting environment, including community opposition affecting project siting.

Segment and technology developments

Dell’Oro Group reports that thermal management remains the fastest-growing DCPI segment, and that liquid cooling is the fastest-growing technology. The report states that rack densification moves liquid cooling from an option to a precondition.

It also says heat rejection coverage expanded in this edition, with water-cooled chillers expected to grow faster than air-cooled units on scalability rather than efficiency. The report states that chillers remain part of data center specifications because free cooling loses effectiveness during the hottest days of the year.

UPS and end-customer demand

The report says UPS growth concentrates in higher power rating three-phase systems, which it expects to expand faster than smaller units as larger building blocks of AI clusters push deployments higher. It also states that medium-voltage designs are gaining ground, connecting UPS systems closer to the grid.

Dell’Oro Group projects solid-state transformers to weigh meaningfully on UPS demand beginning in 2029, first focusing on large AI factories that have largely moved away from UPS-based architectures. It also states that hyperscalers end the period as the largest single contributor to DCPI revenue, while growth slows compared with 2025–26 as workloads move more heavily to colocation partners.

Coverage lines added in the forecast

The report says colocation remains central to the buildout, with the spread of powered shell development shifting equipment procurement onto the tenant. It describes this as moving revenue among customer segments without altering building occupancy.

It also says that in this forecast, AI-specialized Cloud, described as neoclouds and AI model builders, becomes one of the fastest-growing lines in its coverage. The report states that enterprise demand continues to grow but more slowly than the rest of the market.

Forecast scope

Dell’Oro Group’s Data Center Physical Infrastructure 5-Year Forecast covers market sizes and forecasts for UPS, thermal management, cabinet power distribution and busway, rack power distribution, IT racks and containment, and software and services. It also provides manufacturer revenue allocation by customer segments including hyperscaler, other cloud, colocation, telco, and enterprise.

The report also includes forecasts of data center capacity additions by region. The source text does not provide the report’s methodology details beyond the forecast scope.

This Analyst Signals brief reflects a neutral, fact-based summary of the original research note.