Hassan Khan
OpenAI, Oracle, and SoftBank are joining hands on a massive $500 Billion venture to build Artificial Intelligence data centers across the United States. The announcement, made Tuesday, marks another giant step for the Stargate project, an effort that has quickly become one of the most ambitious private tech infrastructure plans ever attempted.
Where the New Sites Are Coming
According to the companies, three of the new facilities will be set up with Oracle in Shackelford County, Texas, Dona Ana County, New Mexico, and a still undisclosed location somewhere in the Midwest. The other two will be built in Lordstown, Ohio, and Milam County, Texas, in partnership with SoftBank and one of its affiliates.
This expansion follows earlier activity in Abilene, Texas, and ongoing collaborations with CoreWeave, bringing the total scale of Stargate closer to 7 gigawatts of computing capacity and over $400 billion in investment already on the table. The overall target is to hit 10 gigawatts once the project is complete.
Read More: OpenAI and NVIDIA Announce $100B Partnership to Build Next-Gen AI Infrastructure
Jobs and Local Impact
The companies say the five new sites are expected to generate about 25,000 onsite jobs, covering everything from construction work to long term operational roles. Local leaders in Texas, New Mexico, and Ohio are likely to see this as a win, with billions in investment flowing into their regions at a time when AI Infrastructure is becoming as important as highways or power grids.
The Bigger Picture
President Donald Trump personally launched the Stargate initiative earlier this year, hosting top tech executives at the White House. For Trump, AI has become both an economic priority and a national security issue, as China pushes aggressively to close the gap in advanced computing.
Tech companies, meanwhile, are racing to lock in the massive amounts of computing power required to run AI Services. Just a day before this announcement, Nvidia pledged up to $100 billion in investment and chip supplies for OpenAI’s Projects.
Funding the Race
OpenAI and its partners plan to use debt financing to lease the high-powered chips that will fuel Stargate. At the same time, OpenAI has agreed to share 8% of its revenue with Microsoft and other partners, highlighting how closely linked the AI ecosystem has become.
What’s Next
In a statement, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman summed up the challenge: “AI can only fulfill its promise if we build the compute to power it.” With construction now stretching across multiple US. states and billions pouring in from allies like Oracle, SoftBank, Microsoft, and Nvidia, Stargate is quickly shaping up to be the backbone of America’s AI future.
