New Delhi–Nvidia is reportedly in talks to provide about $250 billion in financing guarantees to OpenAI for a massive artificial intelligence data center project in Ohio.
The proposed backing would help OpenAI lease a 10-gigawatt data center campus being developed by SoftBank’s energy subsidiary in southern Ohio, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The project is expected to cost more than $500 billion, including the Nvidia chips needed to power the facility.
The proposed $250 billion guarantee would cover the lease and debt financing but would not include the cost of the chips. Nvidia is also reportedly discussing financing as much as $350 billion in OpenAI chip purchases.
The arrangement would allow OpenAI to expand its control over its AI infrastructure rather than continuing to rely primarily on cloud providers such as Microsoft, Amazon and Oracle.
For Nvidia, the deal could secure long-term demand for the company’s AI chips, which are widely used to train and operate advanced AI models.
The financing guarantees are expected to support investment structures intended to reassure lenders that the project has sufficient financial backing.
The first phase of the Ohio facility is expected to be completed by 2028 and provide about 800 megawatts of power capacity.
The project’s electricity supply is reportedly controlled by the U.S. government and financed separately by Japan under a recent trade agreement tied to Tokyo’s commitment to invest $33 billion in a natural gas plant.
The report comes as technology companies and semiconductor manufacturers pursue increasingly large infrastructure partnerships to meet rising demand for AI computing capacity.
Earlier this month, South Korean conglomerates and global technology companies, including Nvidia, agreed to explore projects with a combined potential value of about $950 billion, according to a senior South Korean presidential official.
One proposed initiative calls for SK Group to supply about $750 billion worth of high-performance semiconductors to global technology companies, including Nvidia, over an extended period.
The discussions took place during a high-level meeting in San Francisco attended by executives from major global technology companies and South Korean business groups.
Participants included Samsung Electronics Executive Chairman Lee Jae-yong, SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang. (Source: IANS)
