Hajra Naz
When Meta shared its capital expenditure plans last year, the message was clear: the company intended to spend aggressively to support its growing AI ambitions. During an earnings call last summer, Meta CFO Susan Li emphasized the importance of infrastructure in the AI race.
“We expect that developing leading AI infrastructure will be a core advantage in developing the best AI models and product experiences,” Li said at the time.
Meta Compute: A New Infrastructure Initiative
Meta now appears to be acting on that strategy. On Monday, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the launch of Meta Compute, a new initiative aimed at significantly expanding the company’s AI infrastructure capabilities.
In a post on Threads, Zuckerberg said Meta plans to dramatically scale its energy usage to support future AI workloads.
“Meta is planning to build tens of gigawatts this decade and hundreds of gigawatts or more over time,” Zuckerberg wrote. “How we engineer, invest, and partner to build this infrastructure will become a strategic advantage.”
Why Energy Matters for AI
To put that scale into perspective, a gigawatt equals one billion watts of power. AI data centers consume massive amounts of electricity, and industry analysts warn that the rapid growth of AI could place unprecedented strain on energy systems.
Some estimates suggest U.S. electricity demand tied to AI could grow tenfold over the next decade, rising from roughly 5 gigawatts to 50 gigawatts as AI workloads accelerate.
Leadership Behind the Meta Compute Initiative
Zuckerberg named three executives who will lead Meta’s new infrastructure push.
Santosh Janardhan: Infrastructure and Architecture
Santosh Janardhan, Meta’s head of global infrastructure, will oversee the technical side of the initiative. A Meta veteran since 2009, Janardhan will lead efforts across technical architecture, software systems, silicon development, developer productivity, and the construction and operation of Meta’s global data center and network footprint.
Daniel Gross: Long-Term Capacity Strategy
Also joining the effort is Daniel Gross, who joined Meta last year. Gross is the co-founder of Safe Superintelligence, alongside former OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever.
According to Zuckerberg, Gross will lead a new internal group focused on long-term capacity planning, supplier partnerships, industry analysis, and business modeling related to Meta’s AI infrastructure investments.
Dina Powell McCormick: Government and Financing Partnerships
The third executive is Dina Powell McCormick, Meta’s president and vice chairman, who previously served in government roles. Zuckerberg said she will work with governments around the world to help build, deploy, invest in, and finance Meta’s infrastructure projects.
Read More: Meta confirms acquisition of Manus, an AI startup everyone has been talking about
A Crowded Race for AI Infrastructure
Meta is far from alone in racing to build AI-ready cloud and data center infrastructure. Capital expenditure plans announced last year show that many of the company’s biggest rivals are pursuing similar strategies.
Microsoft has been aggressively partnering with AI infrastructure providers, while Alphabet, Google’s parent company, announced the acquisition of data center firm Intersect in December. The competition underscores how infrastructure is increasingly viewed as a strategic moat in the generative AI era.
