Skip to content
Normalised Alpha
Research Frameworks Tools Adi Index Advisory About
RECAP ·what-changed

July 2026: the month the grid became the ceiling: What Changed Issue 01

What Changed Issue 01. A one-page monthly recap on AI infrastructure power. What NVIDIA, OCP, hyperscalers, and power equipment vendors did in July 2026, what the market is getting wrong, and what to watch over the next six months.

20 August 2026 · 6 min read
ESSAY ·Due Diligence for the AI Buildout

Team, timeline, and the anatomy of a data room

Scoping decides what to test. Execution decides whether the tests get run with signal or noise. Team composition, workstream sequencing, and data room engagement.

20 August 2026 · 40 min read
ESSAY ·Deal Watch

NVIDIA / OpenAI PORTS-Pike: what DD would flag on a $105B guarantee for a phased 4.25 GW Ohio campus

A chip vendor guaranteeing $105B of a customer's lease and power obligations, taking a $1.5B direct equity investment in the project SPV, and standing behind a $4.2B utility grid partnership. Operational DD lens on the NVIDIA-OpenAI PORTS-Pike deal.

19 August 2026 · 19 min read
ESSAY ·Deal Tear-Down

Equinix + CPP / atNorth $4B: what DD would flag on a Nordic data centre take-out

Partners Group exits atNorth. CPP takes 60 percent, Equinix takes 40 percent as strategic operator. Commercial DD scoping applied to a joint sponsor-plus-strategic acquisition of Nordic data centre capacity.

19 August 2026 · 18 min read
ESSAY ·Due Diligence for the AI Buildout

The scoping decision

Most of what determines whether DD creates or destroys value happens before the data room opens. What to examine, at what depth, against what walk-away criteria, with what pre-committed authority.

18 August 2026 · 40 min read
ESSAY ·The Investment Layer

Sovereign capital and industrial policy

Eight sovereign capital pools, twelve national industrial policy programmes, and how the landscape reshapes over the next 24 months. Part VIII of The Investment Layer.

17 August 2026 · 24 min read
ESSAY ·The Investment Layer

The three downside cases

Three distinct scenarios in which the AI infrastructure investment map compresses, with transmission mechanisms, asset exposures, and signals to watch. Part VII of The Investment Layer.

16 August 2026 · 20 min read
ESSAY ·The Investment Layer

Underwriting AI infrastructure debt

The structures, spreads, covenants and rating criteria that determine how $200+ billion of AI infrastructure debt gets priced, and where the underwriting is soft. Part VI of The Investment Layer.

15 August 2026 · 20 min read
ESSAY ·The Investment Layer

The PE playbook, layer by layer

Five recognisable PE playbooks across the six AI infrastructure layers, their return profiles, and the three platform theses being constructed. Part V of The Investment Layer.

14 August 2026 · 21 min read
ESSAY ·The Investment Layer

The coverage asymmetry

Where equity research concentrates, where it misses the material stories, and what the coverage gap tells you about where mispricing sits. Part IV of The Investment Layer.

13 August 2026 · 20 min read
ESSAY ·The Investment Layer

The build-to-lease flip

Hyperscalers moved from majority-owned to majority-leased over seven years. The developer stack that made it possible, and where the return arithmetic breaks. Part III of The Investment Layer.

12 August 2026 · 20 min read
ESSAY ·The Investment Layer

The AI infrastructure M&A map

Every material deal 2023-2026 across the layers of AI infrastructure, four through-lines that describe them, and fifteen forward candidates by name. Part II of The Investment Layer.

11 August 2026 · 22 min read
← Newer Page 7 of 9 Older →
Frameworks
  • The AI Power Chain
  • The Investment Layer
  • Due Diligence Framework
  • Grid-to-Chip
Series
  • The DC-DC Transition
  • Thermal Management
  • The Regulatory Layer
  • Financing the AI Buildout
  • Tech Spotlights
  • Case Studies
  • Deal Tear-Down + Watch
  • What Changed (monthly recap)
Reference & Tools
  • Knowledge Base
  • Adi's Theses
  • Glossary
  • Vendor Screen
  • Question Banks
  • DD Evidence Matrix
  • Investment Scorecard
  • Investment Workbench
Engage
  • Advisory
  • About
  • adi@adikumar.co
  • LinkedIn
  • X (@NormalisedAlpha)
© 2026 Adi Kumar. All rights reserved. All content on this site — including essays, analysis, frameworks, charts, models, code, visualisations, and interactive tools — is the copyrighted work of Adi Kumar. No part may be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, republished, syndicated, adapted, translated, stored in a retrieval system, quoted at length, incorporated into commercial products or reports, or used to train machine-learning or artificial-intelligence models — in whole or in part, in any form or by any means — without the prior express written permission of the author. Brief quotations of up to 100 words with clear attribution and a direct link to the source page are permitted under fair use. All other uses require written consent: adi@adikumar.co.
Written by Adi Kumar · Privacy