As AI adoption, high-density computing, and digital transformation reshape India's technology infrastructure, reliable power, cooling, and resilient deployment strategies have become more critical than ever. In this exclusive conversation with Rajeev Ranjan, Editor, Digital Terminal, Jaideep Roy, Director, Business Development (IMS), Vertiv, shares insights on evolving data centre infrastructure, power quality challenges, and the vital role of channel partners in enabling mission-critical deployments across India.
Rajeev: While AI-led growth is driving fresh demand for digital infrastructure, how significant is the challenge of power quality and grid variability in shaping today's data centre and enterprise deployments in India?
Jaideep: The conversation often gravitates toward compute density, but the more foundational challenge is power quality. Grid variability is not a hypothetical risk in India. It is a daily operational reality across many regions. Voltage fluctuations, harmonic distortions, and frequent micro-outages put real pressure on sensitive IT and power electronics.
The entire upstream power chain, from the utility point of entry through UPS systems, PDUs, and busbars, needs to be engineered with variability as a baseline assumption. At Vertiv, we increasingly see customers revisit their power architecture not because they've outgrown capacity, but because reliability issues trace back to poor power quality tolerance in legacy designs.
Rajeev: As rack densities rise and workloads become more demanding, how are traditional assumptions around power distribution, cooling, and uptime being redefined?
Jaideep: The industry operated for years on a stable set of assumptions like average rack densities of 5–8 kW, air-based cooling as the default. Those assumptions are breaking down. GPU-accelerated workloads are pushing rack densities into the 30–100+ kW range, fundamentally changing what's possible with conventional air cooling and standard power distribution.
The shift is toward more granular power delivery. Higher-voltage DC distribution, intelligent PDUs with real-time monitoring, and modular UPS architectures that scale in step with demand. Liquid cooling, whether direct-to-chip or rear-door heat exchangers, is no longer emerging, it is becoming a design requirement for high-density deployments.
Rajeev: In a market like India, where infrastructure conditions can vary widely by region, how should enterprises and operators design systems that balance resilience, efficiency, and long-term scalability?
Jaideep: India is not a homogeneous infrastructure market. What works in Mumbai or Bengaluru may be inadequate for an enterprise edge deployment in a Tier-2 or Tier-3 location where grid quality is lower, ambient temperatures are higher, and skilled O&M support may not be readily available.
The principle we advocate for is "adaptive resilience", building systems tolerant of local conditions rather than relying on ideal inputs. This means UPS systems with wider input voltage windows, modular and containerised infrastructure where site conditions are unpredictable, and remote monitoring capability to compensate for limited on-ground expertise. A pay-as-you-grow model, supported by modular power and cooling architectures also makes more financial and operational sense than over-provisioning upfront, particularly for organisations expanding across geographies.
Rajeev: Many organizations focus on capacity planning but underestimate execution challenges. In your experience, where do most infrastructure projects fall short during deployment or operational stages?
Jaideep: Capacity planning is well understood, but execution is where most projects lose ground. There are a few recurring failure points.
First, there is a gap between design intent and site reality. Specifications are drawn up under ideal assumptions, but the actual site rarely conforms. Cable routes, thermal airflow paths, and earthing systems all present surprises that become costly delays for teams that haven't done rigorous pre-commissioning site validation.
Second, operations teams are onboarded too late. The people who will run the facility need to be involved during commissioning, not handed a manual afterward. Understanding fault conditions, alarm interpretation, and safe switching procedures needs to be drilled, not just documented.
Third, preventive maintenance is consistently underfunded. Battery health monitoring, thermal imaging of connections, and periodic load bank testing are not optional. They are what separates a reliable facility from one that fails unpredictably.
Rajeev: As businesses move toward high-density and mission-critical environments, what new approaches are emerging in power management and thermal optimization to ensure performance without excessive cost?
Jaideep: The most significant shift is toward intelligence at the infrastructure layer. Historically, power and cooling systems operated independently and reactively. What's emerging is a more integrated and predictive model.
On the power side, this means lithium-ion UPS systems with longer service life and integrated battery health analytics, alongside three-phase modular architectures that maintain high efficiency even at partial loads. On the thermal side, AI-driven cooling management, where systems anticipate heat loads from IT workload telemetry and adjust proactively, is moving from pilot to production in larger deployments. This significantly reduces the energy waste of over-cooling, which has historically been the default safe option. Combined with liquid cooling for the highest-density clusters, these approaches let operators hit performance targets without brute-force energy spend.
Rajeev: How important are channel partners, system integrators, and solution providers in driving business growth and ensuring successful last-mile deployment of critical infrastructure across India?
Jaideep: They are central to both our growth strategy and our customers' success. India's infrastructure market is geographically vast and operationally diverse. No manufacturer, regardless of direct salesforce strength can effectively reach and support deployments across the full breadth of the market without a strong partner ecosystem.
What we've invested in at Vertiv is not just channel reach, but channel capability. A partner who can sell a product is valuable. A partner who can design the right solution, execute the deployment correctly, and provide credible post-installation support is transformative. Local system integrators carry knowledge that cannot be replicated centrally. They understand the site, the customer's operational model, the local regulatory environment, and what is serviceable in that geography. Empowering those partners with the right tools, training, and Vertiv support is what allows us to deliver consistent quality across a highly heterogeneous market.
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