Wide-bandgap power moves to the AI rack as data centres go 800V
Navitas joins Nvidia's MGX 800VDC push; SiC and GaN replace silicon to break the AI 'power wall', borrowing EV power architecture
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Summary
AI's power demand is forcing a rewrite of data-centre electrics, and wide-bandgap power semiconductors are the enabler. The industry is shifting to 800VDC rack architecture, borrowed from EVs, to unlock an order-of-magnitude rise in rack power; at 800V, SiC and GaN efficiency gains outweigh their cost premium over silicon IGBT/MOSFET. On 3 June 2026 Navitas joined Nvidia's MGX ecosystem for 800VDC infrastructure, showing at COMPUTEX a GaN 800V-to-6V power-delivery board that eliminates the 48V intermediate-bus stage inside the server tray. HVDC architectures can cut data-centre energy use up to ~7%; the data-centre power-electronics market is projected to grow ~2.5x by 2036.
By the numbers
- 800 VDC, the rack architecture AI data centres are adopting (from 48V/415V).
- ~7%, potential data-centre energy-use reduction from HVDC + wide-bandgap.
- 98.5%, peak efficiency of Navitas's 10kW DC-DC platform (Feb 2026).
- ~2.5x, projected growth in data-centre power-electronics market by 2036.
- 3 June 2026, Navitas–Nvidia MGX 800VDC collaboration announced.
Why it matters
The bottleneck on AI scaling is increasingly watts, not FLOPs. Wide-bandgap power lets a rack draw and deliver far more power at higher efficiency, easing the grid strain behind the gas-and-nuclear data-centre buildout. It also moves value to SiC/GaN suppliers (Navitas, Wolfspeed, Infineon) and ties AI infrastructure to the same supply chain as electric vehicles.
What to watch
- 800VDC moving from COMPUTEX demos to shipping Nvidia MGX racks.
- SiC wafer and GaN device supply as AI and EV demand compete.
- Which power-semiconductor suppliers Nvidia and hyperscalers standardise on.