Omen AI liquid cooling startup raises $31m Series A to guard data centre coolant. Omen AI, the liquid cooling startup founded by a 20-year-old high school dropout, has closed a $31 million Series A to bring continuous, real-time fluid monitoring to AI data centres, where contaminated or degraded coolant can force costly chip cluster shutdowns costing millions of dollars in lost computing time. Why Omen AI's liquid cooling sensors are filling a gap. Data centres have long relied on posting coolant samples to external labs and waiting days for results. Omen AI's miniaturised spectrometer monitors fluids continuously, watching specifically for copper and chromium released by component wear, silicon from seal degradation, and bacterial growth, according to AI Weekly. Founder and chief executive Zach Laberge has likened the device to a 'blood test' for cooling infrastructure: catch the problem early, before the patient needs surgery. The urgency is real. Flushing an affected rack takes five to six hours and can cost millions in lost computing time, The AI Insider reported in its coverage of the fundraise. Making matters worse, operators are adjusting coolant formulations to use more water as AI chips run hotter, which improves heat absorption but also accelerates bacterial contamination, The AI Insider added. From construction sites to data centres. Laberge first founded a company in 2020, at the age of 14, raising $3 million to install sensors on construction equipment, and dropped out of high school at the same time, TechCrunch reported. He incorporated Omen AI in 2024, initially targeting excavators, before the pivot to data centres. That pivot came roughly six months before the Series A announcement, after equipment dealerships told the company they were fitting sensors to turbines and asked whether Omen could address 'the building side of things,' according to TechCrunch. Laberge concluded the fluid-monitoring technology was '100 times more valuable for data centers.' Omen now sells permanent sensors and portable devices on a subscription basis priced per megawatt. Its more than a dozen customers are mostly neoclouds, the specialised AI cloud providers, though Laberge said the company is also beginning to work with larger cloud operators. Devices also analyse fluids in industrial machines beyond the data centre. A broad investor list and a long runway. Nava Ventures led the round, with Cory Rellas of Nava joining Omen's board as a result, The AI Insider noted. Other participants included CRV, former Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg, industrial filtration company Mann+Hummel, and executives from AI cloud provider TensorWave, a customer. The Omen AI press release names a wider group of backers: Mike Mattacola, Vanderbilt University, LMNT Ventures, Borusan Ventures, Starhill Holdings, Hard Launch Capital, and executives from Bridgestone, GM, and Johnson Controls. Caffeinated Capital and Genius Ventures are also listed among the company's backers. The Series A follows an $11 million Seed round closed in September 2025, which brought in Banter Capital, OpenView Venture Partners, Pareto Holdings, and others, according to Startup Intros. Omen has raised $41.5 million in total to date. The company employs 30 people in San Francisco. Laberge said he hires for skill over formal credentials and that most of the team are themselves college dropouts. Omen will use the new funding to grow its engineering team and scale manufacturing. The market backdrop is driving urgency. Global data centre capacity is expected to nearly double to 200 GW by 2030, with liquid cooling becoming the default for new construction, according to McKinsey research cited in the Omen AI press release. Laberge's next test is whether Omen can move fast enough to become infrastructure rather than a niche monitoring tool before the larger cloud operators build their own solutions in-house.

Omen AI secures $31M for data center fluid monitoring technology. Jul 01, 2026 | Posted by Abdul-Rahman Oladimeji Omen AI has raised $31 million in Series A funding to develop systems for monitoring servers and other data center equipment. The San Francisco-based company's round was led by Nava Ventures, bringing its total funding to $41.5 million since its 2024 founding. Investors include former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg, CoreWeave CBO Mike Mattacola, CRV, Vanderbilt University, LMNT Ventures, and executives from firms including Bridgestone, GM, Johnson Controls, and TensorWave. Omen AI uses fluid analysis to monitor the health of servers and industrial equipment, helping predict failures before they occur. Its sensors attach directly to cooling systems such as oil, coolant, or water lines and provide real-time analysis of metal content, contaminants, wear patterns, and fluid degradation. CEO Zach Laberge said traditional fluid monitoring methods are too slow for modern infrastructure, noting that delays in lab testing can be "dangerously inadequate" when managing high-value computing and industrial systems. "Omen AI was built to prevent catastrophic failure. We help data centers push their hardware to the absolute limit, unlocking compute performance operators didn't know they had, and enabling industrial machine operators to prevent costly failure." The firm says it already works with data center operators representing $200 billion in assets and between 10GW-14GW of capacity. For these customers, Omen AI monitors coolant health in real time. "Whether it's a liquid-cooled AI infrastructure or a fleet of industrial machines, the cost of an unplanned failure is staggering," said Cory Rellas of Nava Ventures. "Despite the high stakes, these systems are still monitored with lab tests that take days. Omen AI built the solution: continuous, real-time visibility into the health of the machines doing the world's most critical work. Zach and his team aren't just building a better sensor; they're building the nervous system for the machines powering the modern world." There are 4958 data centers in United States.

Omen AI has raised $31 million in a Series A round to develop technology that monitors chip coolant in data centers and prevents bacterial outbreaks. The startup focuses on optimising data centre operations through coolant management systems.