SoftBank and OpenAI support U.S. artificial intelligence infrastructure project

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OpenAI and SoftBank said on Tuesday they planned to launch a massive new U.S. artificial intelligence infrastructure project, a move that Donald Trump hailed as a “declaration of confidence in the United States.”

The joint venture, called Stargate, plans to spend $100 billion on big tech infrastructure projects, rising to $500 billion over the next four years, the group said late Tuesday. It’s unclear how Stargate will be funded, but people involved in the project said they intend to bring in more investors.

“This landmark undertaking is a resounding declaration of confidence in America’s potential under a new president,” Trump said at the White House on Tuesday night, where he was also joined by Masayoshi Son and OpenAI boss Sam Altman. and Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison.

Trump added that Stargate will build “physical and virtual infrastructure to power the next generation of advances in artificial intelligence, including the construction of massive data centers.”

The news comes as tech executives seek to curry favor with Trump, who is eager to score major U.S. investment wins early in his term. The president said Stargate would create 100,000 jobs “almost immediately” and keep “the future of technology” in the United States.

SoftBank will have ultimate financial responsibility for the new company, and OpenAI will assume operational responsibility. Masayoshi Son, chairman of Tokyo-based SoftBank, will chair the joint venture.

Abu Dhabi’s National Artificial Intelligence Fund MGX and Oracle are also providing funding for the project, while SoftBank’s Arm, Microsoft and Nvidia are technology partners.

Stargate is designed to improve the ability to train and run new artificial intelligence models. The company will first build a data center project in Abilene, Texas — construction on that project has already begun, according to the company — before expanding to other states.

The rapid development of artificial intelligence systems in the past two years has stretched the infrastructure of the United States, with data centers becoming a particular bottleneck. Cutting-edge models such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, and Anthropic’s Claude chatbot require large amounts of data and computing power to train and operate.

“This program will not only support the reindustrialization of the United States but will also provide strategic capabilities to protect the national security of the United States and its allies,” OpenAI said in a statement.

Earlier this month, Hussain Sajwani, chairman of Dubai-based real estate developer Damac, announced plans to invest at least $20 billion during a meeting with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in Florida. US dollar building US information center.

Leaders in the field of artificial intelligence, including OpenAI’s Altman, believe better infrastructure is critical to developing the next stage of artificial intelligence models and competing with China for technological dominance.

Altman said earlier this month that the Trump administration could use “American-built infrastructure and a lot of infrastructure” to promote the development of domestic artificial intelligence companies.

“I very much agree with the president on how difficult it has become to build things in the United States. Power plants, data centers, things like that,” he said in an interview with Bloomberg.

In his inaugural address on Monday, Trump promised that the United States was on the verge of an “exciting new era of national success,” but he made no specific mention of artificial intelligence technology.

Last month, Trump called SoftBank’s separate commitment to invest $100 billion in the United States “a huge demonstration of confidence in the future of the United States.” Stargate will be a key component of the previously announced $100B commitment, a person familiar with the matter said.

“This is the beginning of a golden era,” Son said on Tuesday, adding that the company would not have made the investment if Trump had not won re-election, a sentiment echoed by Ellison and Altman.

Son has long had a broad vision for SoftBank’s development in artificial intelligence, from robotics to data centers, all anchored by his crown jewel, British semiconductor design company Arm, which he hopes to see The company produces its own wafers. The SoftBank founder also holds a large stake in OpenAI and speaks regularly with Altman.

SoftBank shares rose 7.5% in Tokyo as investors learned for the first time the specifics of Son’s ambitious artificial intelligence vision.

“For the first time we have specific details on SoftBank’s AI ambitions, and… when we look at what they’ve hinted at before, it’s probably The best place to start,” he said, referring to the group’s “high-profile partners” in the Stargate program.

Additional reporting by Rafe Uddin and Alex Rogers