Super Micro shares surge as AI boom drives 100,000 quarterly GPU shipments

(Reuters) -Super Micro Computer said on Monday it is currently shipping more than 100,000 graphics processors per quarter and unveiled a new suite of liquid cooling products, sending the AI server maker's shares up about 14% following a weeks-long slump.

A boom in generative artificial intelligence technology has bumped up demand for the hardware required to process the large amounts of data genAI uses, helping Super Micro, which makes servers featuring leading AI chips including Nvidia's.

It "recently deployed more than 100,000 GPUs with liquid cooling solution (DLC) for some of the largest AI factories ever built," Super Micro said in a statement.

Super Micro is on track to add more than $3 billion to its market value if gains hold.

The company is acclaimed for its liquid cooling technology, which boasts greater power-saving than the air cooling techniques used in some data centers.

Nvidia's shares were up more than 4%.

Monday's rally provides a breath of relief to Super Micro's investors after the stock was slammed by mounting troubles, including Hindenburg Research disclosing a short position in the company in August.

Short interest in Super Micro is just over 20% of its free float, worth about $3.59 billion, market research firm Ortex estimated.

"If this is related to short sellers trying to buy back shares or not is too early to tell at this point, but at the current price, short sellers are making short-term losses and may choose to close their positions," Ortex said, noting this could have added to the stock's gains on the day.

Super Micro's shares lost more than 9% of their value over the last two weeks, but are still up more than 66% this year, benefiting from Wall Street's booming, AI-linked "picks-and-shovels" trade.

The company also launched a new range of DLC products, which would enable the "highest GPU per rack density", with up to 96 of Nvidia's B200 chips per rack.

"Up to 40% energy savings for infrastructure and 80% space savings are a massive innovation for large, power-hungry AI deployments and could be a key differentiator to competitors," said Gadjo Sevilla, senior AI and tech analyst for eMarketer.

(Reporting by Arsheeya Bajwa, Medha Singh and Deborah Sophia in Bengaluru; Editing by Pooja Desai and Shreya Biswas)