Coolgradient makes data centers intelligent by converting existing data into actionable recommendations and improved visibility, delivering increased reliability and improved sustainability by reducing data center infrastructure energy by up to 40%. Coolgradient achieves these superior results by capturing interdependencies between all operational assets from the mechanical and electrical infrastructure in data centers rather than focusing on isolated assets. This holistic view makes Coolgradient the solution of choice for globally leading clients such as Digital Realty.

Data centers were responsible for 2% of global electricity consumption in 2022, which is expected to increase. By 2030, they are expected to use an average of 3.2% of global electricity consumption, with some countries’ estimations being as high as 6% (US) or even 32% (Ireland) by 2026. As their numbers grow, their CO2 emissions and water consumption also continue to rise. However, due to the vast amounts of variables involved in data center operations and the shifting data and energy demands, data center operators currently have limited ability to find the optimal energy and water settings at any given time.

4impact capital now joins Coolgradient as a software-specialized investor to support the experienced team in scaling its business internationally. The team around Jasper de Vries and René Gompel have decades of experience in data-driven optimisations for industrial applications. Through their existing work with large clients, they have built and optimized best-in-class AI models that can work universally.

As the data center market is expected to boom over the next decades, Coolgradient is set to become a vital cog in the global computing space.

Victor Straatman, Partner of 4impact says “The unrivaled expertise of Jasper, Rene, and their team of people in Amsterdam and across the world make them the obvious choice for many of the world’s leading data center operators. The need for and benefit of their product is crystal clear. As they become a key component of operating this critical infrastructure globally, we are proud to play a part in Coolgradient’s journey of reducing 1% of all global energy used for data center cooling while delivering meaningful cost and resource savings to customers.”

Jasper de Vries, Co-Founder and CPO of Coolgradient, adds, “We are thrilled to have 4impact join our mission for a more sustainable digital infrastructure. They share our passion, and this investment reflects their commitment to seizing the momentum for our product. This will enable further global expansion and increase the impact we create for our customers.”

About Coolgradient

Coolgradient, founded by Jasper de Vries and René Gompel in 2023, aims to reduce 1% of global energy consumed by cooling data centers. Their innovative solution converts every data center into an intelligent facility, covering all infrastructure from roof-to-room. The platform merges existing data with distinct AI models to simplify and optimize increasingly complex data center operations. With their approach, they have achieved remarkable results, such as up to 40% in energy and water savings, increased reliability and resilience, compliance with sustainability regulations, and improved employee productivity.

Contact: Rene Gompel, rene.gompel@coolgradient.com

About 4Impact

4impact capital is a prominent early-stage impact investor in European digital startups. 4impact capital supports passionate founders dedicated to advancing sustainability and creating measurable change, aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly in the areas of Planet and People. Currently, 4impact capital is investing from its second fund, which they anticipate to close later this year. 4impact plans to invest in around 25 companies that capitalize on the massive opportunity at the intersection of digitization and sustainability in Europe, focusing on the Benelux, DACH, and Nordics regions.

Contact: connect@4impact.vc

The two companies will collaborate to apply synthetic data generation and advanced machine learning in physically constrained environments that involve complex interactions. Data centers, for instance, where the behavior of hundreds of assets follows the laws of physics and continuously influences each other, are examples of such environments.  

This research aims to promote the wider adoption of synthetic data generation in similar industrial domains. The expected benefits include a better understanding of complex interactions and reduced reliance on available data. As data is a prerequisite for intelligent resource management in industrial domains, the advantages will enable broader adoption of AI-based optimizations. For data centers, this will reduce energy and water consumption and increase reliability and overall sustainability. 

 “We are excited about this collaboration with Syntho and the support from Provincie Noord-Holland to accelerate the region as an innovation hub for AI. This research enables us to make an even bigger (environmental) impact for our customers.” Jasper De Vries, CPO, and co-founder of Coolgradient. 

“I see a great synergy in the expertise from Coolgradient and Syntho, we are very much looking forward to this collaboration. Together, we’re paving the way for a more sustainable and data-driven future.” Simon Brouwer, CTO and co-founder of Syntho.

About Syntho

Syntho is an Amsterdam-based company revolutionizing the tech industry with AI Synthetic Data. As the leading provider of synthetic data software, Syntho’s mission is to empower businesses worldwide to generate and leverage high-quality Synthetic Data at scale. Syntho’s synthetization approaches include AI-generated, smart de-identification, and test data management.

About Coolgradient

Coolgradient transforms any data center into an intelligent facility, from roof-to-room. We combine existing data with our AI models to simplify and optimize increasingly complex data center operations. We have proven results of 20% average annual energy and water savings, increased reliability and resiliency, compliancy to sustainability regulation and improved employee productivity.

Coolgradient, a pioneer in transforming data centers into intelligent data centers, proudly announces the reception of the highly esteemed Impact Award from the Consulate General of the Kingdom of the Netherlands at the NLinNY event. Co-founder and CEO Rene Gompel accepted the award during a ceremony in the City of Dreams, New York, recognizing Coolgradient’s exceptional efforts in reducing the energy impact of data centers.

Rene Gompel highlighted the critical role of digital infrastructure in our daily lives, emphasizing the increasing challenges to deliver reliable and sustainable data centers. He stated, “Constraints on the energy grid infrastructure, higher energy costs, skilled labor shortages, and increasing regulations mean data centers need to innovate.” Gompel continued, “Our platform uses the power of AI to convert operational complexity into more efficient data-driven operations, increasing sustainability and improving reliability.”

Expressing gratitude for the prestigious Impact Award, Gompel acknowledged the Ministry of Economic Affairs recognition. He praised his team, stating, “I am proud of the Coolgradient team who is delivering on our mission to make the data center industry more sustainable.”

ScaleNL

The ScaleNL Accelerator program, in collaboration with the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, chose Coolgradient as one of the top 10 companies for the 2023 US East Coast ScaleNL accelerator program. This program focuses on facilitating the success of companies in the US market, providing a bridge between their Netherlands strategy and a tailored strategy for the American market.

Sustainable data centers

Coolgradient’s SaaS platform harnesses AI (Artificial Intelligence) to optimize data centers, enhancing reliability, reducing energy consumption, and boosting employee productivity. The platform seamlessly integrates existing facilities’ infrastructure data, eliminating the need for additional hardware. With a focus on continuous optimization, Coolgradient empowers teams to convert millions of data points from mission-critical infrastructure into actionable insights.

To date, Coolgradient has saved clients more than 14,000MWh (14GWh!) with its AI platform. The company also offers advisory services to assist data center operations teams in achieving energy savings quickly while reducing operational risk.

Contact us to learn how Coolgradient can help make your data center more sustainable and reliable.

Stay cool, work smart!

Unlocking Intelligent Efficiency, Without Additional Hardware

Our approach involves harnessing the wealth of available facility data into holistic recommendations to optimize cooling systems, harmonize facility assets and UPS systems from roof to room.

With Coolgradient, there is no need for additional hardware or complex IoT (Internet of Things) projects. We have not only reduced energy consumption but also help extend the lifetime of mission-critical assets. Not to mention, your teams will have peace of mind knowing their systems are fully optimized to deliver site reliability.

The Coolgradient AI Platform

So, how does Coolgradient achieve these impressive results? Our in-house experts have trained our machine learning models with over 240 billion data points and collaborated closely with data center operations teams to validate our models.

Our process starts with collecting data from your cooling and energy systems. We then use our SaaS platform to analyze the data, automatically identify inefficiencies, quantify potential savings, and validate the findings. If required, we work with your operations teams to co-create implementation plans to ensure prompt implementation.

After implementations, your teams can use our platform to monitor any impact of the adjustments continuously. Our goal is to ensure your entire infrastructure remains harmonized with the ever-changing dynamics of your data center.

Coolgradient Success Stories

Let’s explore how we collaborated with our customers to achieve these remarkable energy savings:

1. Cooling Efficiency

The traditional “set and forget” approach is no longer adequate as cooling systems get more complicated, compute configurations become denser and PUE targets get more challenging.

Our machine learning models have been trained to find optimization opportunities, inefficiencies and malfunctions in (multi-mode) hybrid chillers, drycoolers, cooling towers, IAC and water source cooling systems. With our customers we found many energy saving areas. Some frequently occurring problems we discovered are with chilled water rings, malfunctioning dry coolers, blocked filters, and malfunctioning 3-way chiller valves, to name a few.

Sometimes the teams had an idea that there was a problem but had not validated and quantified the impacts. Our tool did both and provided prescriptive recommendations. Other times we discovered inefficiencies that the teams were unaware of by using AI’s power. It was not only legacy data centers but many new data centers that were not operating exactly as they were designed to run.

Combined with our AI models and in-house experts, we delivered advisory services and collaborated with the data center operational and design teams. We carefully examined the findings, quantified their impacts, and provided clear recommendations to address these issues. Subsequently, we devised an implementation plan to realize the optimizations. After changes were made our data center software delivered enhanced monitoring which assured that savings were realized without jeopardizing customer SLAs.

Up to now, we have achieved substantial energy savings, conserving approximately 6,200 MWhs, specifically in data center cooling equipment.

In addition, these efforts have significantly reduced wear and tear on mission critical assets, enhancing their reliability and potentially prolonging their operational lifespan.

2. Data Center Cooling Harmonization

To enhance data center efficiency, our machine learning models analyzed the entire cooling system from roof to room to harmonize the complete data center cooling ecosystem. If some components of your infrastructure are not optimized, the rest of your cooling systems are working harder than needed, which consumes more energy and increases equipment wear and tear. Not to mention stress for the operational team, who may know it is not optimal, but are not sure where to adjust and what other impacts that will have on the entire system.

With this holistic approach our SaaS platform consistently found inefficiencies and our AI models recommended optimization solutions across the whole data center infrastructure. The most common optimizations identified were CRAC system tuning, CWR (Chilled Water Rings) setpoints, CRAH fan speeds, too-high modulating valve openings, optimal floor pressure and differential pressure setpoints.

Our tools reduced complexity and increased visibility by showing what the operation teams should focus on to have the most impact. After delivering recommendations, we collaborated closely with local operations teams and crafted implementation plans. They then used our SaaS platform to enhance monitoring to make sure that the optimizations they implemented had the desired effect and did not adversely impact other parts of the cooling system to ensure they met their ASHRAE standards.

Across multiple data centers, we’ve achieved remarkable energy savings of 4,300 MWh by optimizing from roofs to rooms. These enhancements not only reduce energy consumption but also improve uptime and asset reliability, offering peace of mind to operations teams in delivering energy savings without compromising uptime.

Example optimization schedule:

3. UPS Efficiency

In 2023, we started focusing on UPS systems for our customers and integrated UPS data into our platform.

Our SaaS platform found many of the data centers where the UPSs were not at optimum efficiency. Some were even showing alarming health deterioration over time. Working with the local ops team we changed some settings, resulting in an energy savings of 3,650 MWh per year. Not to mention some peace of mind for the teams as we discovered a potential UPS risk.

Join the Coolgradient journey to intelligent and sustainable data centers

Coolgradient believes in the power of collaboration. With our AI models, your existing data, and our team of in-house experts working in tandem with your operations teams, we ensure continuous data center optimization, leading to substantial energy savings and improved reliability.

Lower energy costs also enhance your competitiveness, improve ESG and increase readiness for upcoming PUE regulations.

If your data center setup is unique, not a problem. Our team and AI are up to the challenge we can develop machine learning models to meet your specific needs and deliver optimization. RTU (rooftop units), IAC (Indirect air cooling), Adiabatic…no problem our team and models will adapt to your specific needs.

We take immense pride in our partnership with our customers and are excited to have achieved over 14,000 MWh in energy savings. Stay tuned as we onboard more locations and help our customers meet their sustainability and reliability targets.

Stay Cool, Work Smart.

The Coolgradient Team

Only 10 could make it, and Coolgradient is one of them! We’re very proud to announce that Coolgradient has been selected for the 2023 US East Coast edition of the ScaleNL Accelerator program after a thorough selection process.

This accelerator program is supported by the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy in partnership with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It focuses on bridging the gap for companies between their Netherlands strategy and new strategy explicitly catered for success in the US market.

The selection was based on current Dutch and European success and the potential for growth in the US market. Another confirmation of the customer value Coolgradient delivers and the potential to make a global impact.

Participating in this program will contribute to our existing growth in the US market.

Read more about it here:

ScaleNL – 10 Dutch startups scaling to the US East coast in 2023 with ScaleNL Accelerator