Six Samsung Affiliates Commit USD 1 Billion to KKR's AI Infrastructure Firm Helix

Samsung Electronics and five of its sister companies: Samsung C&T, Samsung SDS, Samsung SDI, Samsung Life Insurance and Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance, have together pledged USD 1 billion to Helix Digital Infrastructure, an AI infrastructure company created by global investment firm KKR. Samsung Electronics accounts for USD 500 million of the total, while the remaining five affiliates share the rest.

A Coordinated Move Into AI Infrastructure

Helix was launched in June 2026 with a mandate to serve as an AI-enabling infrastructure provider offering integrated solutions spanning the full value chain: hyperscale data center development and operations, power generation across both baseload and flexible energy sources, transmission and distribution infrastructure, and fiber-optic networks. The company's premise is that hyperscalers can use it to quickly secure the large-scale, comprehensive infrastructure needed to match exponentially rising AI demand.

At the helm is Adam Selipsky, the former CEO of Amazon Web Services, who is building out a management team drawn from leaders in the data center and power industries. Helix also draws on KKR's global infrastructure business, which fields roughly 170 dedicated professionals. Samsung joins a founding investor group that includes KKR, the Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA), NVIDIA, and US power company Vistra.

Compute and Power as Twin Competitive Fronts

The announcement describes AI data centers as moving well beyond standalone facility investments to become core business platforms, bundling high-value models such as GPU-as-a-Service (GPUaaS), Sovereign AI, and colocation services.

Their rapid expansion is creating a vast multi-sector ecosystem touching power generation, cooling technologies, semiconductors, and finance, and the Samsung affiliates framed their investment as a strategic commitment to securing next-generation AI leadership within that landscape. As AI services penetrate deeper into daily life and global industry, the announcement notes, demand is growing for data centers that can process massive compute workloads, and for the specialized power infrastructure needed to run them stably. In the company's framing, if data centers are the production hubs of the AI era, power is the fuel driving them, making the ability to secure compute and power simultaneously a defining competitive advantage in the industry. Helix's strategy targets both sides of that equation.

It identifies power availability as the single greatest bottleneck in AI infrastructure today and plans to move quickly to secure energy capacity through direct investments and strategic partnerships with major energy developers, including its own investor Vistra. For the Samsung affiliates, the investment is positioned as a pivotal milestone: an opportunity to translate hardware and component expertise into system- and infrastructure-level influence. Samsung stated it aims to broaden its role from traditional hardware component supplier to active architect of the global AI infrastructure ecosystem.

Where Each Affiliate Fits Into the Stack

The affiliates bring capabilities at every layer of the AI infrastructure stack, providing what the companies describe as a strong basis for future cooperation with Helix. Samsung Electronics' Device Solutions (DS) Division supplies the semiconductor solutions underpinning the global buildout and is structured to respond promptly to shifts in worldwide demand. Its Device eXperience (DX) Division, meanwhile, offers a broad portfolio of data center cooling products and solutions,ranging from air cooling systems to coolant distribution units (CDUs) for liquid cooling, via FläktGroup, the data center HVAC specialist it acquired in 2025. With 14 production sites worldwide and a supply and service network spanning 65 countries, the DX Division is positioned to meet hyperscalers' demands for rapid capacity expansion.

Samsung C&T's Engineering & Construction Group acts as an engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) contractor on large-scale projects across data centers and power generation. Samsung SDS designs, builds and operates data centers as an IT solutions provider and has recently entered the GPUaaS business. It holds the lowest power usage effectiveness (PUE) level in Korea, a standard it applies to its own data centers as well as the Korea AI Computing Center (KOACC). Samsung SDI contributes strength in uninterruptible power supplies (UPS) and battery backup units (BBUs), technologies essential for data centers running high-performance servers around the clock. The company plans to pursue new business opportunities in this field, where ultra-high-output, high-capacity battery technology is a prerequisite.

Next Steps for the Partnership

Through the investment, Samsung Electronics and its affiliates intend to accelerate global AI data center deployment alongside Helix while maximizing collaborative synergies among the participating companies. Samsung's commitment to Helix's global AI infrastructure build-out sits alongside that of founding investors KKR, the Kuwait Investment Authority, NVIDIA, and Vistra.