OpenAI to lease massive new AI data centre in US, backed by $105B Nvidia financing

ChatGPT-maker OpenAI will lease a massive new data centre in the United States for 20 years, backed by a US$105 billion financing commitment from Nvidia, according to a regulatory filing published on Aug 17.

The project will be built on the site of a former Cold War-era uranium enrichment plant in Ohio and could eventually grow to have 8GW of capacity, making it the largest single data centre for artificial intelligence. The facility will also run "exclusively" on Nvidia chips.

Energy is central to the deal: SoftBank and SB Energy, the data centre's owner and a SoftBank subsidiary, will invest more than US$4 billion into local energy infrastructure and build at least 10GW of new energy generation to power the campus, while OpenAI will commit US$40 million to "support local priorities."

Nvidia will additionally invest US$1.5 billion in SB Energy. Pre-empting criticism about so-called circular financing — which has fuelled fears of an AI bubble — Nvidia said in a blog post that "OpenAI will pay the lease" and that the deal was made with "the same discipline we apply to supply-chain management."

The filing underscores how AI developers continue to depend on supplier financing to fund enormous capital expenditures even as their revenue grows explosively.

The combination of a 20-year lease and a $105 billion financing commitment makes the Ohio campus one of the deepest forms of supplier-backed AI infrastructure to date, and it would become the largest single AI data centre if built out to 8GW.

What to watch next: the phased buildout of the 8GW campus, whether grid and power timelines match the promised 10GW of new generation, and whether this deep-financing lease model becomes the norm for AI data centre buildouts.