Nvidia Weighs $3 Billion Stake in SoftBank Unit to Power OpenAI Data Centers
The chipmaker's planned equity injection into SB Energy highlights the massive capital deployment required to secure power and physical infrastructure for advanced artificial intelligence workloads.
Nvidia is negotiating a $3 billion equity investment in SB Energy, a SoftBank subsidiary tasked with building a major data center campus in Ohio for OpenAI. The move underscores how semiconductor giants are increasingly forced to finance the physical infrastructure underpinning the artificial intelligence boom.
According to people familiar with the discussions, the chipmaker plans to split the funding. Half of the capital would be deployed upon the signing of the Ohio project agreement, with the remaining tranche tied to SB Energy’s upcoming initial public offering.
The energy and infrastructure developer is targeting a public listing as early as next month. The IPO is expected to raise a minimum of $5 billion, providing SoftBank with a significant liquidity event while funding the massive power requirements of modern AI models.
This equity stake forms part of a wider financial arrangement aimed at securing roughly $100 billion in credit support for the Ohio facility. The sheer scale of the capital required illustrates the immense costs associated with training and deploying next-generation generative models.
Yet the broader scope of Nvidia's financial backing appears to be narrowing. The chipmaker has revised its initial commitments for the Ohio project, according to market reports. The company is now expected to provide less than $120 billion in guarantees, a substantial reduction from the $250 billion previously under discussion.
Founded in 2019 and also backed by OpenAI, SB Energy specializes in large-scale power and data center infrastructure. As AI workloads surge, securing dedicated power and specialized facilities has become a critical bottleneck for technology companies. This shift forces traditional hardware suppliers to act as project financiers, blurring the lines between semiconductor manufacturing and heavy infrastructure development.
Neither Nvidia nor SB Energy immediately responded to requests for comment outside regular business hours. The discussions remain subject to final agreements.
