Ecolab to Acquire CoolIT Systems for $4.75B
Deal Continues M&A Spree in Liquid Cooling Sector with Higher Densities on the Horizon
Sustainability specialist Ecolab has agreed to acquire liquid cooling company CoolIT Systems for $4.75 billion in cash, the companies announced today. The seller was funds led by investment firm KKR, which acquired the company in 2023.
The deal’s valuation adds an exclamation point to the headlines about M&A in the liquid cooling sector.
CoolIT is a leading player in direct liquid cooling (DLC), which has seen widespread adoption recently as data center operators upgrade their cooling technology to support high-density AI workloads. It has been in the liquid cooling for 25 years, with offerings include cold plates, cooling distribution units (CDUs), and direct-to-chip cooling technologies.
The deal will bolster Ecolab’s Cooling-as-a-Service offering, which helps data centers improve performance, reduce downtime and lower water use across their operations.
“AI is transforming the demands on data centers, and liquid cooling is one of the critical technologies that makes advanced computing possible,” said Christophe Beck, Ecolab chairman and chief executive officer. “By bringing together CoolIT’s engineered cooling technologies with Ecolab’s expertise in water, chemistry and digital service, we can provide our customers a complete cooling solution that improves performance and reliability while reducing water and energy use.
“This acquisition expands our role in serving the AI ecosystem - semiconductor fabs that manufacture chips, power plants that fuel the chips, and data centers that utilize the chips - and positions Ecolab as the partner that the world’s largest technology companies rely on to grow responsibly and sustainably.”
CoolIT is expected to generate approximately $550 million in sales over the next 12 months, and the acquisition is expected to double Ecolab’s Global High-Tech market opportunity from $5 billion to $10 billion, the company said.
Ecolab’s Cooling-as-a-Service offering serves more than 1,000 data centers, including major hyperscaler and colocation customers, with strong revenue growth visibility from large-scale data center deployments.
The acquisition will be financed with new debt, and is expected to close in the third quarter of 2026, subject to regulatory approvals.
From Gaming to HPC and Data Centers
CoolIT was founded in 2001 to provide liquid cooling systems for high-end gaming PCs. In 2012 it pivoted to high-performance computing (HPC) and data centers, providing specialized cooling systems for some of the world’s most powerful supercomputers, including the El Capitan 1.8 exaFLOP system.
It has recently gained a larger foothold in the data center sector. As chip power consumption rises, traditional air cooling is reaching its limits, and the industry is seeking liquid cooling alternatives to support the extreme compute density in AI Factories.
The acquisition comes as the industry is gearing for even denser racks to support NVIDIA’s Vera Rubin platform, which could push densities to 600 kW per rack by 2027.
The growing appetite for liquid cooling is driving M&A activity in the data center sector, as leading vendors invest to manage the rising power demands of AI workloads.
Here’s a list of some of the recent investments and deals in the data center cooling space:
Feb. 2026 - Trane Technologies agrees to acquire liquid cooling specialist LiquidStack as part of a strategic move to address the extreme thermal demands of generative AI a
January 2026: Johnson Controls and Legrand invest in Accelsius: JCI led a $65 million Series B funding round for Accelsius, a two-phase direct-to-chip cooling company, with strategic participation from Legrand.
December 2025: Trane Technologies acquires Stellar Energy
November 2025: Vertiv announced an agreement to acquire PurgeRite, which specializes in cleaning and filtering fluid loops for data center cooling systems for $1 billion, with the transaction expected to close in 4Q 2025.
November 2025: Power management giant Eaton signed an agreement to acquire Boyd Thermal (the thermal business of Boyd Corporation) from Goldman Sachs Asset Management for $9.5 billion to bolster its liquid cooling capabilities for AI data centers.
November 2025: Daikin Applied Americas continued its acquisitive ways in the cooling sector, announcing the purchase of Chilldyne, an experienced player in liquid cooling known for its negative pressure liquid cooling systems for HPC and AI data centers.
August 2025: DDC Daikin bought high-density cooling specialist DDC Solutions, which offers rack containment systems for both air and liquid-cooled designs.