Schneider Electric, a global energy technology leader, and AMD recently announced a jointly developed and validated reference design for the AMD Helios rackscale solution that provides a scalable blueprint for deploying high-density AI environments faster and with reduced risk and complexity. The reference design marks the first milestone of the collaboration between Schneider Electric and AMD and delivers upon the companiesโ joint focus to create an easier path to AI Factory deployment.
The new reference design is the first ever developed to support high-density AI workloads on the Helios rackscale solution, which is powered by AMD Instinctโข MI455X GPUs, 6th Gen AMD EPYCโข CPUs, AMD Pensandoโข Vulcano NICs and the open ROCmโข software ecosystem. AMD Helios is designed to deliver breakthrough AI performance through advances in compute, interconnect bandwidth, memory capacity and system-level integration, allowing customers to run larger, more complex AI workloads faster while optimising power and efficiency.
As AI workloads push data center infrastructure to unprecedented limits, reference designs provide data center architects and operators with tested, scalable designs proven to handle new power densities, thermal requirements and operational complexity. By modeling data center physical infrastructure performance, these preโvalidated blueprints help shorten the planning process by defining how power, cooling, and IT infrastructure should be organised to build a reliable, scalable, and AIโready data center. The AMD Helios reference design includes information on four technical areas: facility power, facility cooling, IT space, and lifecycle software.
This need is particularly evident in the Gulf, where demand for AI-ready infrastructure is accelerating rapidly. In the UAE alone, live data center capacity surpassed 376 MW in 2025, with major AI and hyperscale expansions underway as the country positions itself as a global hub for artificial intelligence and cloud services. Furthermore, Gartner forecasts spending on data center systems across MENA to reach US$12.98 billion in 2026, up 37.3% year-on-year, making it the region’s fastest-growing IT segment as organisations invest in AI-optimised infrastructure.
โToday organisations require comprehensive, AI-ready reference designs that can take them from planning to deployment faster and with less risk,” said Manish Kumar, Executive Vice President, Secure Power & Data Centers at Schneider Electric. โThrough our collaboration with AMD, we’re delivering an engineering-backed reference design that bridges the gap between advanced AI compute platforms, energy tech, and real-world data center implementation, enabling customers to deploy scalable, high-density AI environments with greater confidence, efficiency, and speed.โ
โAI infrastructure is rapidly moving to full-scale AI factories, and that requires compute, networking, power and cooling to be designed together from the start,โ said Forrest Norrod, executive vice president and general manager, Data Center Solutions Business Group, AMD. โAMD Helios provides an open, rack-scale architecture built to deliver the performance, efficiency and flexibility required for next-generation AI workloads. By working with Schneider Electric to create a validated reference design, we are giving customers a practical blueprint to accelerate high-density AI deployments, reduce integration risk and scale with greater confidence and efficiency.โ
Reference Design Accelerates AMD Helios Deployment
The new collaboration brings together AMD AI platform innovation and Schneider Electricโs expertise in power, cooling, and digital infrastructure, creating a more tightly integrated approach to deploying both greenfield AI factories and high-density retrofit environments. The reference design supports:
– Modular, multi-cluster environments, featuring AI clusters of up to 10.4 MW IT capacity for greenfield deployments.
– High-density AI workloads up to 246 kW per rack.
– Advanced liquid cooling using Motivair by Schneider Electric CDU-based and hybrid air/liquid approaches capable of removing up to 84% of heat.
A digital-first infrastructure approach, which includes:
– Electrical and thermal design validated using ETAP and EcoStruxureโข IT Design CFD simulation tools that enable real-time monitoring and analytics, AI-driven predictive maintenance, and system-level optimization across power, cooling, and IT.
– Integrated Electrical Digital Twin capabilities to model, analyse, and manage infrastructure performance.
– Support from AVEVAโs Unified Operations Center for real-time monitoring and operational visibility.
– Power and cooling infrastructure deployments that adhere to AMD Helios platform requirements for reduced integration complexity and deployment risk.
– Better energy efficiency, with ability to achieve PUE as low as ~1.12 at full load.
The reference design has been validated to ANSI standards for U.S. deployments, with plans to extend the framework to support IEC standards for global implementations in the future.
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