Click Here to View the Recorded Webinar
(Registration is still required to view this FREE Webinar)
Date: Thursday, January 22, 2026
Time: 11:00 AM ET
Duration: 1 Hour
Description:
Over time, the priorities of the Open Compute Project Community’s focus on servers and rack systems have evolved from improving interoperability, integration, and energy efficiency, to preparing server platforms and datacenters for the growing demands of AI workloads; this includes a strong focus on sustainable growth. Worldwide use of OCP-recognized infrastructure continues to increase thanks to a rapidly expanding OCP vendor ecosystem and the way hardware designs are openly shared and available to any organization that wants to access and implement them. Over the next few years, IDC expects total spending on OCP-recognized infrastructure to outpace total market expenditure across several key segments.
This webinar will provide an overview of the current state of the market for OCP-recognized infrastructure, as well as providing insights into how this growing market is expected to evolve in 2026. And will provide relevant advice to technology suppliers and buyers, helping them make decisions that will benefit their organization.
Who should attend?
Data Center Operators and Colocation Providers, IT Equipment System Architects, Technology Vendor Product Management and Marketing, Data Center Facility Design Consultants, Sustainability and Energy Managers, IT Decision Makers and Procurement Teams, Enterprise CIOs/CTOs
What will you learn?
- Benefits of Deploying OCP-recognized Equipment
- Impact of OCP Community Designed Equipment by Market Segment
- IT, Facilities and Physical Infrastructure Products Adopting OCP Community Designs
- 5-Year Forecast Guiding Future Data Center Facilities and IT Equipment Designs
- Top Use Cases Driving Deployments of OCP-recognized Equipment
Speakers:
Steve Helvie
Chief Emerging Ecosystem Officer, Open Compute Project Foundation (OCP)
Steve Helvie is the Chief Emerging Ecosystem Officer for the Open Compute Project (OCP), where he leads the development and scaling of new ecosystems that advance open innovation and accelerate adoption of open hardware. His work centers on enabling early-stage technologies, building alliances that unlock market-opening deployments, and creating pathways for new solutions to commercialize within the global OCP community. He works closely with technology contributors, solution providers, and data center operators to transform open designs into deployable infrastructure, expanding access to efficient, interoperable, and sustainable hardware for a growing range of markets beyond hyperscale.
Chris Drake
Senior Research Director, Compute Infrastructure and Service Provider Trends, Worldwide Infrastructure Research, IDC
Chris Drake is Senior Research Director within IDC’s worldwide infrastructure research organization and part of the compute infrastructure and service provider trends practice. As part of the compute infrastructure research, Chris covers key trends in the computing systems, platforms, andtechnologies markets. This includes high-end, accelerated, in-memory and heterogeneous computing infrastructure systems, platforms, and technologies. These include servers with discrete and embedded accelerators (e.g., GPUs, FPGAs, and ASICs) deployed in the cloud, at the core, and at the edge. Chris’s research spans mission-critical computing platforms, mainframes, and RISC-based systems as well as their associated operating environments (e.g., Linux, z/OS, UNIX). As part of the service provider research, Chris covers global and regional xSP buy side adoption trends and strategies complementing IDC’s research on xSP infrastructure supply chain and ODM Direct, and OEM vendor strategies. Chris’s research – delivered via syndicated and special intelligence services – provides insights that enable IT vendors, providers, and buyers to develop strategies and investment plans for digital infrastructure to power their internal and external services portfolio.
Kuba Stolarski
Research Vice President, Compute Infrastructure and Service Provider Trends, Worldwide Infrastructure Research, IDC
Kuba Stolarski is Research Vice President within IDC’s worldwide infrastructure research organization and global research lead for the compute infrastructure and service provider trends practice. Kuba leads a team of analysts that deliver industry and market insights on computing systems,platforms, and technologies as well as the service provider space. In the compute infrastructure domain, Kuba is IDC’s lead server analyst. His research on compute covers areas such as OEM and ODM Direct vendor strategies, server and non-server form factors, processors and function-offload accelerators, memory technologies, edge computing infrastructure, cloud and non-cloud deployments, bare metal, virtualized and containerized infrastructure, and confidential computing. Kuba oversees research on high-end, accelerated, in-memory and heterogeneous computing infrastructure systems, platforms, and technologies. These include servers with discrete and embedded accelerators (e.g., GPUs, FPGAs, and ASICs) deployed in the cloud, at the core, and at the edge. It spans mission-critical computing platforms, mainframes, and RISC-based systems as well as their associated operating environments (e.g., Linux, z/OS, UNIX). He also oversees IDC’s service provider research which includes insights on demand (buyers) and supply chain (sellers).