Australian start-up WinDC has partnered with US-based infrastructure provider Armada to deploy modular, portable data centres at renewable energy sites, as part of a strategy to use curtailed generation to support AI workloads. The companies said the partnership will see the rollout of 11MW of modular AI infrastructure across renewable energy locations in New South Wales and other parts of the National Electricity Market, as well as Western Australia. The first unit has already been delivered to Australia.
Separately, WinDC is seeking to raise AUD 176 million in a Series A funding round, according to reporting by Australian Financial Review, as it looks to finance its initial deployments and scale its modular data centre model.
The partnership centres on deploying shipping container-sized data centre units directly at wind, solar, and battery sites, allowing compute infrastructure to operate using energy that would otherwise be curtailed due to grid constraints. WinDC claimed Australia curtailed 7.2TWh of renewable energy in 2025, up from 4.5TWh the previous year, with the figure forecast to exceed 10TWh in 2026 as transmission capacity struggles to keep pace with generation growth.
Rather than relying on new transmission infrastructure to move electricity to urban data centre hubs, the WinDC-Armada model places compute capacity at the point of generation, effectively converting excess energy into digital workloads.
“Australia has the wind, the sun, and the land to be a genuine force in global AI infrastructure. What has been holding us back is the grid,” said Andrew Sjoquist, founder and CEO of WinDC. Under the agreement, Armada will design and manufacture the modular units, which are currently produced in the US and Europe. The companies said they plan to explore local manufacturing in Australia once sufficient deployment scale is reached.
Each unit is designed for rapid deployment, with installation timelines of around 90 days, and can be relocated by truck. The systems are designed to operate on renewable energy and use closed-loop cooling systems that do not require water.
Dan Wright, co-founder and CEO of Armada, said the approach enables AI infrastructure to be deployed without waiting for grid upgrades or large-scale data centre developments. “This partnership enables compute to be built where energy is produced, delivering scalable infrastructure without relying on transmission expansion,” he said.
Modular approach targets energy and AI constraints
The partnership reflects an interesting shift in the data centre sector, where developers are exploring alternative deployment models to address two converging constraints: access to power and time to market. Traditional hyperscale facilities can take several years to secure land, obtain grid connections, and complete construction. In contrast, modular systems aim to shorten deployment timelines and provide greater flexibility in siting.
WinDC said its model is designed to improve the economics of renewable energy assets by enabling generators to monetise curtailed electricity. By consuming power locally, the approach could also reduce pressure on transmission networks, which are increasingly congested in regions with high renewable penetration.
The company has positioned its infrastructure as supporting AI training workloads, where latency requirements are less stringent than for inference, making regional deployment more viable.
According to the AFR, WinDC is targeting customers including “neo-cloud” operators, sustainability-focused enterprises, and research organisations. The company does not supply compute hardware directly, instead providing infrastructure and access to renewable energy for customers deploying their own systems.
From concept to deployment
WinDC said it commissioned its first modular unit in January 2026 following joint design work with Armada. The companies claim module densities are approaching 2MW of IT capacity per unit, reflecting increasing power requirements for AI workloads.
The partnership builds on Armada’s existing deployments in international markets, including projects in the Middle East, where modular infrastructure has been used to support high-density compute in regions with constrained traditional data centre capacity. The companies said their platforms integrate Armada’s edge orchestration software with WinDC’s energy management systems to optimise the use of renewable power during operations.
Positioning Australia in the AI infrastructure landscape
WinDC said the model could support Australia’s ambitions to attract global AI infrastructure investment by leveraging its renewable energy resources. Australia has seen growing investment in data centres, but much of the capital backing large-scale AI infrastructure has flowed offshore. WinDC is positioning its approach as a way to anchor compute capacity domestically by aligning it more closely with energy availability.
The partnership also includes a longer-term ambition to localise manufacturing of modular units in Australia, aligning with broader policy discussions around sovereign capability and domestic infrastructure development. While still at an early stage, the WinDC–Armada collaboration highlights how energy constraints can spur new data centre design models, with modular and distributed architectures emerging as an alternative to traditional centralised facilities.