How One Company Aims To Accelerate The Delivery Of Data Centers

With the growth of artificial intelligence and its processing demands, it has never been more important for a data center developer to get a facility up and running quickly. In 2023, $101.6B was invested in U.S. data centers, and that figure is forecast to reach $148.5B by 2029.

But data center development can be delayed by the challenge of installing the power infrastructure. In some cases, lead times for electrical equipment can be two years or more. 

The aim of Power and Data Management, a manufacturer of utility-grade transformers, is to provide the fastest lead times possible to data center developers, said PDM Managing Partner and President Jake Ring. In response to high demand, the company will soon open its first North American manufacturing location in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Already, the lead time for PDM’s transformers is lower at nine weeks than an industry-high 115 weeks, Ring said. 

“To provide the facilities the likes of Google and Amazon need so quickly, data center developers all want to be first to build,” Ring said. “Our job is to simplify the job of providing power. We bring real value in the form of speed to market, and our new facility is only going to accelerate this further.”

PDM has grown rapidly since it was co-founded by Ring and Chief Financial Officer Francis Sheng in 2021. 2024 revenues have exceeded expectations, Ring said, quadrupling from the prior year. The two met at General Electric, where both recognized the opportunity to create data centers. 

Both have experience in running aligned businesses. Ring previously founded data center developers DC Blox and Giga Data Centers, while Sheng worked on the investment side as managing partner of real estate developer Garden Capital.

This background gave PDM a network of contacts across the data center industry in the U.S. and China, where the company had been manufacturing transformers until now.

“When we first founded PDM, we thought we’d focus on design and development of data centers, which we did, but we needed transformers,” Ring said. “At that time, suppliers were quoting more than 35 weeks for a 65-megawatt data center in Texas, but we needed to build the powered shell in six months.”

Through their network, Ring and Sheng identified companies in China that were producing high-quality transformers and established a joint venture to bring them to the U.S. as a white-label product under the PDM brand. 

PDM has honed its processes and distribution partnerships to deliver transformers in as little as nine weeks, Ring said. 

“When you deliver competitively priced, high-quality products in super-fast lead times, this creates great value for data center developers,” Ring said. “Now the crucial area of power is not such a challenge.”

Today, PDM can quickly provide all elements of power distribution equipment that a data center needs, Ring said. As well as manufacturing transformers, the company has a distribution agreement with the GE-XD joint venture to provide other products, including high-voltage circuit breakers and gas-insulated switchgear with a lead time of four to six months.

“We can bring power from the transmission grid down to distribution level, all the way to servers themselves,” Ring said. “PDM is a one-stop shop, providing all the power infrastructure a developer needs.”

PDM’s new manufacturing facility will be located in a manufacturing campus operated by one of its customers, Quality Electrical Systems. This will increase the business’s reach into other markets, such as the solar renewable contractors and electric utilities that need domestically made products.

Until now, PDM has been shipping fully assembled transformers to the U.S. from China. Moving forward, the team will bring in parts and do the final assembly and testing in the new facility. This will provide easier factory witness testing and quality assurance for customers, Ring said.

PDM plans to grow as the data center market continues to accelerate. The company’s production capacity is 2,000 transformers a month in China. As data centers continue to be developed, PDM will grow further, Ring said. 

This article was produced in collaboration between Power and Data Management and Studio B. Bisnow news staff was not involved in the production of this content.

Studio B is Bisnow’s in-house content and design studio. To learn more about how Studio B can help your team, reach out to studio@bisnow.com.