美国数据中心每年使用170亿至190亿加仑的水冷却其热跑芯片，据水基金会称，这一数字在未来五年内预计将增加两倍。
这对投资者来说是一个昂贵且政治上棘手的建议，减少用水的一个办法是更好地监测冷却液，目前的任务是将样品送到实验室，在多日时间内进行测试。
预言AI成立于2024年，目的是解决这个问题。 公司正在建造一个实时传感器，以确定阀门是否失灵，或者系统内的细菌生长是否可能窒息水流。 在6月份筹集了3 100万美元的A系列资金之后，Omen现在正在以1 600万美元的现金和股票交易收购竞争者水产实验室。
在Omen创始人Zach Laberge通过过滤空间的投资者将推出交给Aquatetic Labs的首席执行官Allan Adams之后，这项交易得以达成。 两家初创公司正在用互补技术建造实时水传感器：Omen的传感器在水中寻找元素，而Aquatic Labs传感器则测试其碱性。
将这两种技术放在同一个传感器中，“对水和流体的描述更加丰富。” Adams告诉TechCrunch，同时统一了他们以前缓慢的手工过程自动化的愿景。
该组合将创始人的两个经典物种联合起来：拉贝格从大学辍学去追求他的第一个公司，后者对依赖液压的大型建筑机进行了类似的流体分析。 亚当斯是一位学者，受过物理学训练，他在创办公司之前，曾以麻省理工学院教授和伍兹霍尔海洋学研究所研究员的身份，花了很多时间开发先进的海洋遥感技术。
现在，以亚当斯为公司首席科学官，联合团队正在努力将这两种技术整合到一种传感器中，他们预计在明年初上市。 Omen的初始传感器将监测到年底拉动250至300兆瓦功率的芯片，价值约50至70亿美元，Laberge告诉TechCrunch，希望到2027年底安装在相当于1GW的芯片上。
增加值为：如果流体系统失控，数据中心操作员通常选择倾倒水，而不是冒损坏昂贵设备的风险。 这意味着关闭操作直到恢复流体系统，这需要很多钱。 监测可以让数据中心操作员使用相同的流体更长的时间，并尽量减少清理的成本。
亚当斯希望他们的技术也能在数据中心之外产生影响，他告诉TechCrunch“水进入数据中心，然后水流出来并被倾倒到城市水中，你希望整个过程能够尽可能安全、负责地发生，这意味着你必须测量东西。
AI公司曾经估计，到2030年，AI基础设施将花费高达4万亿美元，但一些投资者已经对建设产生怀疑，导致超规模股票在最近几天内暴跌。 Omen的团队并不担心情绪会转变
拉贝格(Laberge 称 ): “我们正在研究他们今天正在建造或已经建造的东西，“我们的观点是，如果有紧身之处，这仍然是人类历史上最大的市场，即使你把它切成两半。 ”
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US data centers use 17 to 19 billion gallons of water to cool their hot-running chips each year — and that number is expected to to triple in the next five years, according to the Water Foundation.
That’s an expensive and politically tricky proposition for investors throwing billions of dollars at the challenge of scaling up AI. One way to use less water is to do a better job monitoring the cooling fluids, a task that currently involves sending samples away to a laboratory for tests in a multi-day process.
Omen AI was founded in 2024 to solve that problem. The company is building a real-time sensor to determine whether valves were failing, or if bacteria growth in the system threatened to choke off water flow. After raising a $31 million Series A in June, Omen is now acquiring competitor Aquatic Labs in a $16 million cash-and-stock deal.
The deal came together after Omen founder Zach Laberge was introduced to Aquatic Labs’ CEO Allan Adams by an investor in the filtration space. Both startups were building real-time water sensors with complementary technology: Omen’s sensors looked for elements in the water, while the Aquatic Labs sensor tests its alkalinity.
Putting those two technologies in the same sensor creates a “much richer picture of the water and the fluid,” Adams told TechCrunch, while uniting their vision of automating what had previously been a slow, manual process.
The combination unites two classic species of founder: Laberge dropped out of college to pursue his first company, which did similar fluid analysis for large construction machines that depend on hydraulics. Adams was an academic, trained as a physicist, who spent much of his career developing advanced ocean sensing technology as an MIT professor and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute researcher before starting his company.
Now, with Adams as the company’s chief science officer, the combined teams are working to integrate both technologies into one sensor, which they expect to have on the market by early next year. Omen’s initial sensors will be monitoring chips pulling in 250 to 300 MW of power by the end of the year, worth about $5 to $7 billion, Laberge told TechCrunch, with the hope of being installed on the equivalent of 1 GW of chips by the end of 2027.
The added value is in uptime: If the fluid system gets out of whack, data center operators typically choose to dump the water rather than risk damage to their expensive equipment. That means shutting down operations until the fluid system is restored, which costs a lot of money. Monitoring lets data center operators use the same fluid for longer, and minimize the costs of a clean up.
Adams hopes to see their technologies have an impact outside of data centers as well, telling TechCrunch that “water goes into data centers, and then it comes out and gets dumped into municipal water, and you want that whole process to happen in a way that’s as safe and responsible as possible — and that means you got to measure stuff.”
AI companies once estimated as much as $4 trillion would be spent on AI infrastructure by 2030, but some investors have grown skeptical of the buildout, sending hyperscaler stocks plummeting in recent days. Omen’s team isn’t worried about shifting sentiment though, since their work comes after a data center has been built.
“We’re working customers on stuff they’re building today or have already built, and so it doesn’t really affect us because all of those projects were financed 12 months ago,” Laberge said. “Our view is, if there’s tightness, this is still going to be the biggest market in human history, even if you sliced it in half.”
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