This startup just raised $140 million to build wave-powered AI data centers at sea
SMRTR summary
Wave-powered data centers floating in the open ocean sounds like science fiction. But a startup called Panthalassa just raised $140 million to make it real.
The company builds steel towers that bob in deep water, converting wave motion into electricity to power AI chips sealed inside. No grid connection, no freshwater cooling, no emissions. Results travel to shore via satellite.
"We will never be transmitting electricity back to shore," CEO Garth Sheldon-Coulson told the Financial Times. "That makes us very different from all other ocean energy that's been tried in the past."
Sheldon-Coulson describes waves as essentially stored solar energy, calling them "twice-concentrated sunlight" that keeps flowing even when the wind dies.
Backed by Peter Thiel, Marc Benioff and John Doerr, Panthalassa plans its first Pacific deployments in 2026. The company is betting that the open ocean, not land, is where the next generation of AI infrastructure gets built.
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