Computing power leasing heats up as listed companies seize market opportunities

Securities Daily reporter Ding Rong

According to the latest calculations released by OpenRouter, a global AI (artificial intelligence) model aggregation platform, between March 30 and April 5, the total number of global AI model tokens called reached 27 trillion, up 18.9% quarter over quarter. China’s AI model token usage has grown for five consecutive weeks and has exceeded the United States for five consecutive weeks.

The surge in token calls directly boosted demand for AI computing power. Computing power leasing has become an important model for easing the gap in computing power supply. Industry insiders who were interviewed by Securities Daily said that diversified computing power services—including computing power leasing, as well as the recovery and reuse of computing power equipment—can quickly match the computing power needs of enterprises on the application side, and also help the DaaS (Device as a Service, devices as a service) market enter a golden period of growth.

As an important component of the computing power services market, the market size is expanding rapidly. According to projections by market research firm IDC, by 2026 the global computing power leasing market size will exceed $80 billion, with a compound annual growth rate of more than 25%.

From the perspective of the China market, the industry is moving from “scale expansion” to “deepening value.” A recent report released by the China Institute for Industrial Research and HuYuan Technology Development (CIC) titled “Market Research and Investment Potential Forecast Report for the Computing Power Leasing Industry from 2025 to 2030” shows that the industry is transitioning from single infrastructure leasing to integrated services.

As a mature service model that provides equipment leasing, technical services, equipment management, and recovery and reuse for enterprises, DaaS has entered a huge incremental market amid the wave of rapid advances in AI technologies.

Hu ZuoXiong, Chairman of the Board of Lingxiong Technology Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter “Lingxiong Technology”) and founder of the XiaoXiong U Lease, said in an interview with Securities Daily: “As AI large models and agents accelerate their deployment, AI computing power demand is growing exponentially. Especially for small and medium-sized enterprises that lack sufficient funding and technical capability to build data centers themselves, services such as computing power leasing and the recovery and reuse of computing power equipment can significantly reduce their upfront investment costs and lower the barriers for small and medium-sized enterprises to obtain and use computing power. The company has long focused on DaaS, building a complete service ecosystem and possessing a large base of long-term service customers. At present, it is迎来 a new round of market opportunities.”

Recently, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the “Notice on Launching a Special Campaign to Empower Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises with Inclusive Computing Power.” A series of arrangements have been made around key tasks, including the initiative to improve the allocation of computing power resources and the initiative to expand inclusive supply of computing power services. These include encouraging the establishment of dedicated computing power pools for small and medium-sized enterprises and exploring innovative businesses such as “computing power banks” and “computing power supermarkets,” to support small and medium-sized enterprises in depositing idle computing power resources and so on.

In the face of explosive growth in the computing power services market, multiple listed companies have continued to explore in areas such as computing power leasing and the recovery and reuse of computing power equipment, seeking to seize the early market advantage.

Cooper Data Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter “Cooper Data”) has built a diversified revenue model in the computing power services field, including computing power leasing and cloud services, as well as delivery implementation and operations and maintenance services. The company’s computing power services business is mainly based on operating its own computing power assets. It mainly purchases artificial intelligence servers, builds its own computing power clusters, and provides services to customers. It deploys and operates computing power centers in multiple locations, offering customers cloud computing power leasing businesses based on high-end computing power. Cooper Data’s server remanufacturing business includes recovery, dismantling, R&D, production, sales, and repair services for servers.

To address the core pain point that it is difficult for small and medium-sized enterprises to obtain computing power resources at low cost, Lingxiong Technology established a comprehensive intelligent computing ecosystem chain in 2025 and adopted a closed-loop operating service model of “recovery + remanufacturing + leasing.” By recovering devices such as GPUs and servers, and through deep coordination between its equipment recovery business and equipment leasing business, it transforms them into resources that can be leased, providing small and medium-sized enterprises with cost-effective computing power equipment leasing services.

Oriade Optoelectronics Co., Ltd. has built a one-stop integrated computing power comprehensive service system of “elastic supply of computing power—intelligent operations and maintenance management—full lifecycle services.” Customers can choose localized deployment or cloud resource calls according to business characteristics. This allows users to obtain the computing capability they need in a flexible, efficient, and low-cost manner, precisely matching intelligent computing power demand scenarios such as AI model training and real-time inference.

Yu Fenghui, an invited research fellow at the China Finance Think Tank, said in an interview with Securities Daily: “Enterprises need to deeply study the continuously changing market and the needs of enterprise customers, and keep innovating service models, so that many small and medium-sized enterprises can truly lease and use computing power equipment such as AI servers and cloud computing power services at low cost, further improving the utilization efficiency of computing power resources.”