IDC Forecast Sees $800B Open AI Infrastructure Market, Putting Dell’s Strategy in Spotlight
The Open Compute Project Foundation released an IDC forecast projecting about $800 billion in annual spending on infrastructure recognized by the Open Compute Project by 2029, rising to $892 billion by 2030. The estimate covers servers and AI-related equipment, though those categories overlap. For Dell, the report highlights both a larger AI hardware opportunity and the challenge of earning profit as open designs make supplier comparisons easier.
The Open Compute Project Foundation commissioned IDC's forecast, released at 8 a.m. EDT on October 13. It estimates roughly $800 billion in yearly OCP-recognized infrastructure spending by 2029, revised upward from an earlier $295 billion projection for that year, and $892 billion by 2030.
The 2030 total includes $814 billion for servers and $628 billion for AI-related gear, though those figures overlap. Covered equipment spans storage, switches, racks, power, and cooling. Dell's PowerRack accommodates 19-inch and OCP 21-inch formats and bundles planning, engineering, testing, and a single support point.
If the forecast materializes, broader open-hardware designs could make advanced AI infrastructure more widely deployable, potentially affecting cloud providers, enterprises, and public-sector users through availability and cost. Easier supplier comparisons may shift profits among vendors while pressuring Dell to differentiate through integration and support. Communities near data centers could see effects from power and cooling demand, though the scale and distribution of those impacts remain uncertain.