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Nvidia announced a $1.5 billion investment in SB Energy, a data center venture backed by SoftBank and OpenAI. The strategic move secures Nvidia’s position as the exclusive supplier of computing infrastructure for a major facility being constructed near Cincinnati, Ohio. The investment underscores the growing demand for specialized data center capacity as artificial intelligence applications expand across industries.
Beyond the direct investment, Nvidia will extend up to $105 billion in credit to support the project’s development. The Ports-Pike data center is designed to eventually reach 8 gigawatts of capacity, starting from an initial 4.25 gigawatts. SB Energy plans to construct a 9.2 gigawatt natural gas power plant on the site to support operations, with an estimated price tag of $33 billion.
The project’s location on land owned by the U.S. Department of Energy is historically significant, as the site previously played a role in uranium enrichment for nuclear weapons production. The rising costs of natural gas power plant construction—up 66 percent over two years—reflect broader infrastructure challenges facing the data center industry. Energy experts warn that competing demand from natural gas export markets could substantially increase prices in certain regions as multiple large facilities come online.
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Originally reported by Techcrunch →
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