By Steve Kopack
Publication Date: 2026-01-06 22:37:00
In a possible red flag for the AI investment boom, the stocks of companies that provide cooling systems for data centers plunged Tuesday after Nvidia unveiled more efficient chips.
Shares of Johnson Controls slid 6.2%, while the shares of Modine Manufacturing plunged more than 7.4%. Trane’s stock fell 4% and Carrier Global also dipped nearly 1%.
All of those companies sell industrial cooling systems to sprawling data centers, which tech companies are spending tens of billions to build and expand around the world as part of the artificial intelligence investment wave.
Nvidia’s chips are a major driver of the AI revolution. The company’s CEO, Jensen Huang, told attendees of the CES conference in Las Vegas that the company’s next-generation Vera Rubin chips will not require chiller systems to cool the water that keeps the high-powered AI chips at an appropriate operating temperature.
“The power of Vera Rubin is twice as high as Grace Blackwell,” Huang said, referring to the current Blackwell generation of Nvidia chips. “And yet, and this is the miracle, the air that goes into it — the airflow is about the same — and the water that goes into it … is 45°C.”
At that temperature, “no water chillers are necessary for data centers,” he added. “We are basically cooling this super computer with hot water, it is so incredibly efficient.” Forty-five degrees Celsius is the equivalent of 113 degrees Fahrenheit.
The new Nvidia chips could scramble plans for…
