One team, guiding you to gigawatt.

Most data center builds assume a handoff after each phase. That’s where standards slip. GrayMatter’s Insiders stay with the build instead, covering BMS and controls, power monitoring (EPMS), OT security, and 24/7 managed services from preconstruction through expansion. One gigawatt-proven team, one standard, no handoffs.

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Transformation Proven at Scale

82%

of engineers top-tier in commissioning and testing

Gigawatt-scale

deployment experience held by the leaders running the practice

Platform-agnostic

by design — Rockwell, Siemens, Schneider, GE/Emerson, Ignition, AVEVA. Where you already have a fleet standard, we build to it.

Five ways automation programs lose their standards

Data center automation rarely fails on technology alone. It fails on schedule, handoffs, and what’s happening at other sites. GrayMatter is with you the length of the build, so no standards fall through the cracks.

Mission-critical programs are measured in time-to-megawatt, not cost-per-megawatt. GrayMatter engages from preconstruction, with scope gap analysis, long-lead equipment tracking, and master-schedule integration in place before pricing is locked, so the controls path is planned for rather than compressed later.

A standard that lives in one project manager’s head doesn’t survive at the second and third site. GrayMatter runs standardized controls templates, integration guides, sequences of operation, tag naming, and commissioning playbooks program-wide, replicated site to site instead of reinvented, with fleet lessons learned feeding back into the next build.

Cooling lives in the BMS, power lives in the EPMS, switching lives in SCADA. Three systems, three sets of alarms, and an operator checking all of them to work out what’s actually wrong. GrayMatter designs the control architecture so utility-to-rack power, thermal, and equipment data land in one operating picture, with fault detection, alarming, and PUE visibility built in rather than bolted on.

OT security added after commissioning is harder, slower, and riskier than security designed in. GrayMatter engineers segmentation, Zero Trust for control systems, and NIST CSF and IEC 62443 alignment into the controls architecture from the start, by engineers rated in the discipline.

Much of the near-term work in this market happens inside buildings that are already running. Capacity expansions, migrations off legacy control platforms, and retrofits for higher rack densities and liquid cooling are large undertakings. The margin for error is close to zero, and the work still has to meet the same standard as a greenfield build. GrayMatter handles phased cutover inside operating facilities with the same commissioning discipline as a new build, from pre-mobilization through integrated systems testing, with every I/O verified point-to-point.

One hall to a hyperscale campus

GrayMatter works across the full range of mission-critical facility types, from a single enterprise hall to a multi-site hyperscale program, with the delivery model and controls depth each one demands.

Hyperscale

Multi-site program delivery with standardized templates, phased staffing, and a qualified subcontractor bench for hard-to-resource markets.

Colocation & wholesale

Multi-tenant environments where uptime commitments, tenant-level power reporting, and staged capacity releases drive the controls scope.

Enterprise & cloud

Consolidation and modernization of legacy control systems onto a platform the owner’s team can actually operate and extend.

AI & high-density compute

CDU and liquid cooling integration, rack-level thermal and power monitoring, and control architectures sized for densities the original hall wasn’t designed for.

Edge & distributed sites

Standardized control across many small sites, designed to be run remotely rather than staffed individually, with Command24 available to monitor and maintain it.

Adjacent mission-critical

Semiconductor fabs and specialty chemical and pharmaceutical facilities, where the same lifecycle discipline and uptime standard apply.

Industry Insight
Data Centers Are Booming as Build Times & Power Needs Grow

Data centers are booming as build times and power needs grow

Data centers are seeing a boom. But limited server availability, cooling system concerns, and grid upgrades are a bottleneck. GrayMatter helps you break through.

“Three-quarters of the data centers under construction are already committed to users, meaning there’s not much of a capacity buffer.”

Read More

We’ll be right down the hall.

Whether you’re locking scope on a new data center build, trying to hold one standard across a growing program, or planning a density retrofit in a facility that can’t go down, GrayMatter’s mission-critical team is ready to talk through your priorities.

Talk with a Factory Advisor

FAQs

Data center automation is the control layer that runs a facility’s mechanical and electrical systems: the BMS for cooling and environment, the EPMS for power from utility to rack, and the SCADA and alarming that tie them together. GrayMatter designs, builds, commissions and supports that layer from preconstruction through expansion.

Both. On the owner side, hyperscalers, colocation providers, and enterprise operators; on the builder side, general contractors and construction managers delivering mission-critical programs. The engagement model is the same either way — GCs typically bring us in at bid, owners at design.

Yes. Retrofits, expansions, and legacy system migrations inside operating facilities are core scope, handled through phased cutover and the same commissioning discipline applied to a greenfield build — pre-mobilization through integrated systems testing, with every I/O, tag, and graphic verified point-to-point before turnover.

GrayMatter is platform-agnostic by design and works across the major PLC, SCADA, historian, and OT security platforms, including Rockwell, Siemens, Schneider Electric, GE/Emerson, Ignition and AVEVA. Where you already have a standard, we build to it. Where you don’t, we help you choose one you won’t have to unwind later. View our technology partners >

Yes. That includes CDU and liquid cooling integration, environmental monitoring, and rack-level power and thermal visibility, in both new builds and retrofits of halls that weren’t designed for the density.

We start in the design phase. GrayMatter engineers it into the controls architecture rather than adding it at turnover, aligned to NIST CSF and IEC 62443 throughout. We account for network segmentation and Zero Trust for control systems at design, vulnerability detection and patch management in operation.

Your team gets trained, and support is there if you want it. Endura, GrayMatter’s training program, gets your engineers up to speed on the system as built. And if you need outsourced support, Command24 — GrayMatter’s OT managed services — adds 24/7 remote monitoring, preventive maintenance, and SLA-backed support, up to Control-Room-as-a-Service.