Samsung SDI put a cylindrical lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery for artificial intelligence data centers on public display for the first time on Sept. 29, at Data Centre World Asia (DCWA) 2026 in Singapore. The exhibition, held at Marina Bay Sands and running through Sept. 30, brings together more than 600 companies from across the data center ecosystem, from design and construction to operations, according to Yonhap News Agency. The Korea Times reported that this is the first time Samsung SDI has taken part in the annual event.
The booth is split into four zones: uninterruptible power supply (UPS), battery backup units (BBU), the Samsung Battery Box (SBB) and a cell lineup, Yonhap reported. In the UPS zone the company is showing a solution it says is the first in the world to meet all criteria in the Indoor Large-Scale Fire Test run by safety certification body UL Solutions, a test that involves deliberately igniting a battery energy storage system to assess explosion and thermal propagation risk, The Korea Times reported. The BBU zone displays high-power, high-capacity 21700 cylindrical ternary cells with a bottom-vent design, next to the new cylindrical LFP cell. The SBB zone features prismatic LFP batteries for SBB 2.0, an integrated energy storage system that combines batteries, power conversion systems and other components in a single unit. Samsung SDI says the cylindrical LFP cell uses proprietary structural technology to raise power output and capacity while improving safety, and that the prismatic LFP cells pair LFP chemistry with its own prismatic form factor.
"We will continue to introduce solutions that address the diverse needs of data center customers," a company representative told Yonhap.
The launch lands on top of the earnings rebound Samsung SDI reported for the second quarter of 2026, two months before the exhibition. Revenue came in at KRW 3.77 trillion (about USD 2.59 billion), up 18.5 percent (KRW 589.4 billion) year on year and 5.4 percent (KRW 192.4 billion) from the previous quarter, while operating profit of KRW 203.8 billion was positive for the first time in seven quarters, since the third quarter of 2024, the company said. First-half operating profit reached KRW 48.2 billion and net profit for the quarter was KRW 471.6 billion, up 740.5 percent from the previous quarter. The battery business posted revenue of KRW 3.52 trillion, up 18.8 percent, and operating profit of KRW 159.3 billion; the electronic materials business reported revenue of KRW 249.8 billion, up 14.5 percent, and operating profit of KRW 44.5 billion, up 34.8 percent.
Samsung SDI attributed the battery unit's revenue growth to higher sales of high-power batteries for UPS systems, BBUs, power tools and electric vehicles in Europe, and the return to profit to a richer product mix, production tax credits tied to its US manufacturing under the Advanced Manufacturing Production Credit scheme, and US tariff refunds. In its half-year review the company pointed to AI data center demand, particularly for high-power products used in utility-scale energy storage, UPS and BBU systems, as a driver of the recovery. It said it expects the improvement to continue in the second half, supported by prismatic LFP battery production in the United States and by AI-driven UPS and BBU demand.
For battery makers, backup power inside data centers is an additional source of demand at a time when growth in electric vehicle battery sales has slowed, and it is the same demand pool Samsung SDI credits for its second-quarter recovery. LFP chemistry is generally positioned by manufacturers as lower-cost and more thermally stable than nickel-cobalt chemistries, at the price of lower energy density, which makes it a candidate for stationary backup applications where cost and fire safety matter as much as the power a cell can deliver per kilogram.
What the launch does not establish is scale. Samsung SDI has not disclosed the new cylindrical cell's capacity in gigawatt-hours, its energy density, its price, the size of any order or the customers involved, and a product debut at a trade show is not the same as volume shipments; DCWA runs for two days and closes on Sept. 30. The claim of a world-first in the UL Solutions indoor large-scale fire test applies to the UPS solution rather than to the new cylindrical LFP cell, and it is a company statement rather than a published test report. The second-quarter profit also includes items that are not tied to data center demand, notably US tariff refunds and production tax credits, so the earnings recovery cannot be read as a straight measure of AI-related battery sales. Samsung SDI's own outlook for the second half ties further gains to US prismatic LFP output as well as UPS and BBU demand, which means the data center push has to be judged alongside the company's broader energy storage and electric vehicle order book.
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