Does AI Float?: The need for massive infrastructure to store digital data is growing, so tech giants are trying some novel approaches. Samsung's shipbuilding division, for example, would like to move AI data centers away from the mainland and out to sea.

Hitachi recently announced a partnership with Mitsui O.S.K. Lines to develop floating systems to host self-sustaining AI data center facilities. Now, Samsung Heavy Industries is cooperating with different partners to fully develop its novel Floating Data Centers (FDC) concept. Samsung Heavy Industries is a South Korean shipbuilding company that's part of the wider Samsung Group conglomerate.

While Hitachi is working with Mitsui to convert existing vessels into "refurbished" data center plants, Samsung HI is doing something different. The Korean corporation recently signed an agreement with Capital Clean Energy Carriers, a Greece-based shipowner, to develop new data-ready vessels from scratch.

Samsung HI Executive Vice-President and CTO Young-kyu Ahn previously stated that FDCs are a new business model that brings shipbuilding capabilities and digital infrastructure together. Samsung has already developed its 50MW-class FDC model, which could run on both a self-generating power system and an external power source coming from the mainland.

Samsung's 50MW FDC concept design has already been approved by the American Bureau of Shipping and Lloyd's Register, but the job is not done yet. Together with Capital Clean Energy, the Asian giant is now looking to fully validate its concept with real-world prototypes. The partnership is instrumental in checking for potential issues with the FDC design, looking for reliability problems with the data-related workloads, humidity or salinity damage, vibration, and more.

Turning a data center operation into a seafaring vessel is no easy feat, which is why Samsung previously signed an agreement with Supermicro to develop new server setups. At any rate, Samsung HI is investing significant energy in this new FDC idea.

A few weeks ago, the company signed yet another agreement with US venture Mousterian Corporation. The Dallas-based specializes in developing floating and "water-adjacent" data center infrastructure, which is a core concept behind the FDC design.

According to Mousterian CEO Min Suh, the partnership with an established shipbuilding business such as Samsung HI serves as a clear demonstration of the business viability of floating data center designs. A few months ago, Samsung signed an agreement with OpenAI to greatly expand AI data center capacity around the world. If the FDC model works, some of these facilities might not be on land.