Nvidia is in early talks to guarantee up to $250 billion in financing that would let OpenAI lease computing capacity from a planned $500 billion data center campus in Piketon, Ohio, according to people familiar with the matter cited by Bloomberg and CNBC. The facility, still in negotiation, would rank among the largest data center commitments tied to any single U.S. site.
The campus is planned for the site of a former federal uranium-enrichment facility in Pike County, southern Ohio, and is being developed under SoftBank Group’s expanding AI infrastructure push through its energy subsidiary, SB Energy. The project is designed to eventually support 10 gigawatts of computing capacity, with an initial 800-megawatt phase targeted for 2028, according to the reports.
How the backstop would work
Under the structure being discussed, Nvidia’s financial guarantee would let OpenAI borrow against the strength of Nvidia’s credit to fund the data center lease and the underlying construction debt, rather than Nvidia funding the project directly. The arrangement is separate from a roughly $350 billion financing package the two companies are also discussing to cover the cost of the Nvidia chips that would fill the facility, Bloomberg reported.
Both figures underscore how heavily AI infrastructure spending now depends on financing arrangements between chipmakers and their largest customers, rather than conventional real estate or corporate debt markets alone. Nvidia effectively becomes a credit backstop for the physical buildings and power infrastructure that its own chips will occupy.
People familiar with the discussions cautioned that negotiations remain in early stages and that terms could change or the talks could collapse before a deal is finalized, according to CNBC.
What it means
Verified facts: Nvidia and OpenAI are discussing a financing guarantee tied to a $500 billion, 10-gigawatt data center campus planned for Piketon, Ohio, under SoftBank’s SB Energy. Attributed reporting: people familiar with the talks describe the guarantee as covering lease and construction debt, with chip financing negotiated separately.
RealtyWire analysis: If finalized, the arrangement would add to a pattern in which chipmakers underwrite the real estate and power infrastructure that its own hardware will fill, a structure increasingly common in the largest AI data center deals nationwide. It is distinct from RealtyWire’s earlier reporting on Nvidia’s separate $500 billion data center partnership with South Korea’s SK Group and from OpenAI’s previously reported Project Camellia campus in Georgia.
What to watch: Whether Nvidia and OpenAI finalize terms, whether SoftBank secures the power capacity needed for the Piketon site’s later phases, and whether similar backstop structures appear in other major data center financings as developers race to secure sites for AI compute demand.
Source: CNBC
