Dongxing Securities: IDC industry is expected to accelerate the transformation and upgrading of traditional data centers

The Zhitong Finance App learned that Dongxing Securities released a research report saying that although the IDC industry has ushered in AI development opportunities, the proportion of high-power cabinets in the stock is still low. Looking ahead to 2025, the IDC industry is expected to accelerate the transformation and upgrading of traditional data centers, driven by new business formats such as the privatization and deployment of DeepSeek by domestic enterprises, the explosion of big model inference services, and the Internet of Vehicles. Currently, the IDC industry has increased capital expenditure, leading companies are performing steadily, and supporting policies at the top level are not yet effective. The current boom in the AIDC industry is expected to last more than 3 years.

Dongxing Securities's main views are as follows:

Investing in IDC depends on the increase, and more on the stock market

The AI-driven IDC industry is entering the AIDC development stage. However, it cannot be ignored that at present, the domestic IDC is already a huge industry with a market size of over 150 billion yuan and a standard rack size of 8.8 million units. Seizing investment opportunities in the AIDC industry depends not only on the demand for incremental intelligent computing centers, but also on the operation of the existing data center market. The original data center cabinet underwent high-power transformation, which is the only way for IDC companies to enter the AI era.

In 2024, the data port will actively carry out the renovation of existing cabinets

In 2024, Dataport's data center spent 226 million yuan on upgrading technology equipment, an increase of 82.3% over the previous year, and the growth rate hit a record high since 2020. In 2024, data ports account for about 11% of high-power cabinets. Assumptions: (1) Assuming that the construction cost of a single cabinet is 120,000, and high-power cabinet renovation expenses account for 10%, corresponding to 12,000 yuan; (2) Dataport's 2024 data center equipment renewal expenses are about 100 million yuan for high-power transformation. It can be calculated that the company has about 8,300 high-power cabinets, accounting for 11% of the cabinet stock.

CenturyLink's retail business accounts for about 15% of high-power cabinets

According to Century Internet's annual report, by the end of 2024, the company's base-type business operating capacity was 486 MW, which translates to a capacity of 8 KW/about 60,800 standard cabinets, and 52,100 urban business cabinets. The average power of a single cabinet in Century Internet's base business is about 8KW/unit, all of which can be divided into high-power cabinet parts; according to Dongxing Securities estimates, the company's urban business (retail model) high-power cabinets account for about 15%.

Related targets

Runze Technology (300442.SZ), Baoxin Software (600845.SH), Guanghuan New Network (300383.SZ), Wangsu Technology (300017.SZ), Aofei Data (300738.SZ), Dataport 603881.SH (), Runjian Co., Ltd. (002929.SZ).

Risk Alerts

(1) Demand for AI computing power falls short of expectations; (2) stricter energy policies; (3) changes in the competitive landscape.