Global server shipments this year are expected to grow about 6 percent from last year to 14.49 million units, while artificial intelligence (AI) server shipments are forecast to exceed 2.1 million units, rising 24.1 percent year-on-year, Taipei-based market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said on Friday.
Next year, the global server market is expected to grow by more than 4 percent, with the AI server segment set to expand by about 21 percent, it said.
Clients in the AI server market can be broadly grouped into three categories: US cloud service providers (CSPs), Chinese CSPs and international original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), TrendForce research manager Frank Kung (龔明德) said at a forum in Taipei.
Photo: Chiang Ying-ying, AP
Global CSPs’ combined capital expenditures are projected to rise 40 percent this year, signaling strong momentum, even after two years of rapid expansion, Kung said.
The momentum in US CSPs is expected to sustain next year, after leading firms, including Amazon.com Inc, Google, Microsoft Corp and Meta Platforms Inc, significantly raised their capital expenditures, he said.
In China, Baidu Inc (百度), Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴) and Tencent Holdings Ltd (騰訊) continued to play a key role in driving local AI demand since the beginning of this year, Kung said.
Among OEMs, Dell Technologies Inc has shown the strongest performance, followed by HP Enterprise Co, tier-2 CSPs and sovereign cloud operators, he said.
Despite strong market demand, the server supply chain is facing several key risks, including US export controls on chips supplied to China and tariff policies targeting the country, he said.
Meanwhile, it would take time for upstream semiconductor equipment and components to come fully online to meet demand, he added.
AI server racks — including this year’s mainstream models running on Nvidia Corp’s GB200 and GB300 platforms, and next year’s products powered by the Vera Rubin architecture — are adopting increasingly complex designs that require high-voltage power supplies and advanced cooling solutions, which means that server manufacturers would also need to factor in power infrastructure when expanding capacity in the future, Kung said.
Nvidia is expected to ship 5.9 million advanced graphics processing units (GPUs) this year, and between 6.9 million and 7.1 million units next year, he said.
Among server racks based on Nvidia’s GPUs, the GB200 series is expected to dominate this year’s shipments, accounting for 70 to 80 percent of total shipments, as the GB300 series only entered mass production this quarter and is expected to become mainstream next year, he said.
Total rack shipments of both series are projected to reach 36,000 units this year and increase to 59,000 units next year, he added.
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