Nvidia Slashes Backstop for OpenAI's Ohio Data Center Campus
Nvidia has revised its financial commitment to OpenAI's planned data center campus in Ohio, reducing its proposed backstop from $250 billion to less than $120 billion. The chipmaker had been considering putting too much of its own balance sheet behind efforts to stimulate demand for its AI chips.
Investors had pushed back on the scale of Nvidia's financial commitment, worried about the company's exposure.
The restructured arrangement calls for Nvidia to backstop just the opening phase of the build-out, covering approximately five gigawatts of capacity, with any decision on funding the rest to come at a later stage. OpenAI is still in discussions to sign a binding lease for the full 10-gigawatt project, which would be the largest data center campus announced to date if completed.
Nvidia's commitment would allow the project to borrow more cheaply, since creditors would have greater assurance that the money is there. The company is also discussing a separate arrangement to finance OpenAI's purchase of chips, a figure that could total $350 billion across the full project.