The Infrastructure Investor Podcast

KKR: Parts of AI market running ‘a bit hot’ in one of tech’s fastest capex cycles

2025-12-04 · 08:00 UTC ·PEI Group ·1 min read

Brief

AI infrastructure investing is the focus of Bruno Alves’s conversation with KKR’s Waldemar Szlezak, who argues that while demand is real, some segments are overheating during an unusually rapid capex cycle. The discussion centers on the mismatch between durable data-centre assets and quickly aging GPUs, and on the execution complexity—what Szlezak calls a coordination tax—of building integrated infrastructure from energy inputs to rack-level deployment.

Why it matters

Waldemar Szlezak, KKR’s global head of digital infrastructure, said parts of the AI infrastructure market are running “a bit hot” amid one of the fastest capital-expenditure cycles in tech history, raising the question of whether a bubble is forming.

Key details

  • Szlezak contrasted the long useful life of data-centre infrastructure with the much faster obsolescence cycle of the GPUs inside those facilities, highlighting a key mismatch in AI infrastructure investing.
  • The conversation also covered the industry’s “coordination tax” and KKR’s “molecule to the rack” strategy, framing AI infrastructure as a full-stack build problem that spans power and physical facilities through to compute deployment.
Source evidence

title: KKR: Parts of AI market running ‘a bit hot’ in one of tech’s fastest capex cycles
author: PEI Group
contenttype: podcast
publication: The Infrastructure Investor Podcast
published: 2025-12-04T08:00:00+00:00
sourceurl: https://infrastructureinvestorpodcast.podbean.com/e/kkr-parts-of-ai-market-running-a-bit-hot-in-one-of-tech-s-fastest-capex-cycles/

word_count: 165

In this episode, editor-in-chief Bruno Alves sits down with Waldemar Szlezak, KKR ’s global head of digital infrastructure. In a wide-ranging discussion, they address whether there's a bubble forming around AI infrastructure and why parts of the market are overheating during one of the fastest capex cycles in tech history. They then explore the lifespan of data centre infrastructure compared to the rapid obsolescence of the GPUs that power it, touch on the industry's “coordination tax”, examine KKR's molecule to the rack strategy, and much more. We're going to be talking about digital infrastructure a lot at the Infrastructure Investor Global Summit , taking place in Berlin from the 24th to the 27th of March 2026. We have an early bird deadline offer expiring on the 12th of December, which you should definitely consider. So don't miss your chance to lock in discounted registration and join over 3,000 infrastructure decision makers – including 1,000 LPs from 50 plus countries – at the iconic STATION Berlin.