8,000+
Legacy data centers in the US with stranded capacity
Data Center Retrofit Screening
The feasibility study for data center retrofits.
From facility data to investor-ready documentation in days, not months.
- Evaluation Time
- Days, not months
- Cost vs. Traditional
- Up to 95% less
- Built On
- 20+ Interviews
The Problem
The Retrofit Evaluation Bottleneck
35x
The density gap: 3-5 kW/rack (legacy) vs. 175 kW/rack (AI inference)
50%
Of senior GC time wasted screening non-viable retrofit inquiries
$50K–$150K
Cost of a single feasibility study from a traditional consultant
Legacy air-cooled data centers hold valuable assets — metro locations, secured power allocations, fiber connectivity — but can't serve modern AI tenants without retrofit. Today, evaluating whether a facility is worth upgrading takes weeks of expensive consultant work, and most sites turn out to be non-viable. There's no standardized screening framework. Capital sits idle while deals die in diligence.
The Solution
Screen Retrofits Before You Commit Capital
Upload Your Facility Data
Fill in a simple template with your building's key parameters — power, cooling, size, age. Takes minutes, not meetings.
Get Instant Screening Results
Our engine matches your facility to retrofit archetypes and returns a pass/fail assessment with estimated cost range and timeline.
Receive Investor-Ready Documentation
Request a full evaluation package: executive brief, ROI study, and risk assessment — the exact documents you need to move forward.
Process
How It Works
- 01
Download our facility data template
- 02
Fill in your facility's key parameters
- 03
Upload and get instant screening results
- 04
Request your full evaluation package
Who It's For
Built for Infrastructure Decision-Makers
Available Now
PE Developers & Infrastructure Funds
Screen brownfield acquisitions in minutes, not weeks. Know which sites pencil out before committing capital.
Coming Soon
Data Center Operators
Build the business case for your facility upgrade. Generate the internal approval docs your CFO needs.
Coming Soon
General Contractors
Get pre-qualified deal flow with standardized scope packages you can bid against.
Research
From Our Research
Industry evidence of the retrofit evaluation bottleneck, drawn from 20+ interviews with PE funds, operators, and contractors.
“Someone who figures out how to simply and elegantly upgrade a data center in terms of power and cooling will do very well.”
“I spend roughly 50% of my time screening inbound retrofit inquiries, and most of them are non-starters.”
“The M&A team assumed standard build costs, but the actual retrofit ballooned from $7-8M to $16M per megawatt because upfront diligence wasn't thorough enough.”
About the Team
Jonathan Medina is the founder of RespiraTech and an MBA candidate at Harvard Business School. A chemical engineer by training, he spent four years at Dow Chemical managing cooling systems and retrofit projects, and now consults with Harvard IT on data center sustainability. He has conducted 20+ interviews with PE funds, operators, and contractors to understand the retrofit evaluation bottleneck firsthand.
- Harvard Business School
- Dow Chemical
- Six Sigma Green Belt
- CSSL Consultant, Harvard IT
Frequently Asked Questions
RespiraTech screens legacy data center facilities for retrofit potential. Users upload facility data and receive automated screening results, matched retrofit archetypes, and investor-ready documentation packages — compressing months of evaluation into days.
Primarily PE developers and infrastructure funds evaluating brownfield data center acquisitions. We also serve data center operators assessing their own facilities and general contractors screening inbound retrofit inquiries.
No, and we don't claim to. RespiraTech is a screening tool that tells you whether a site is worth the site visit. Think of it as the filter before you spend $50K on a full feasibility study.
Basic facility parameters: power allocation, cooling system type, building age, square footage, and location. You fill in what you know — the tool flags what's missing and works with what you have.
We offer a free screening tier for initial pass/fail results. Full evaluation packages with documentation are available for a per-project fee. Contact us for pricing.
Ready to Screen a Facility?
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