US President Donald Trump is set to announce billions of dollars in private sector investment led by Softbank Group, OpenAI and Oracle to build AI infrastructure in the United States, CBS News has learned. The three companies are preparing to announce the creation of a joint venture called Stargate. The Stargate project to create a 5-GW AI data center for $100 billion was reported last spring, but then it was a joint venture between Microsoft and OpenAI.
Trump is expected to be joined by SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Oracle Chairman Larry Ellison to announce an initial investment of $100 billion, which could be increased to $500 billion over the next four years, Bloomberg reported, citing a White House official.
After the publication of this news, Oracle shares jumped about 7%, breaking the intraday growth record set on December 26 last year, Forbes writes. And Softbank’s American depositary receipts rose 5%. Oracle shares are up about 56% over the past year.
Image Source: Taylor Vick/unsplash.com
It is not clear whether the new project is in addition to or part of the $100 billion investment in the US economy that Son promised during a meeting with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate last month, Bloomberg writes. Son then said that Softbank’s investment would create 100,000 jobs in the United States focused on AI and related infrastructure, including data centers, semiconductor manufacturing and energy. Earlier this month, UAE billionaire Hussain Sajwani promised that his company DAMAC would invest $20 billion in US data centers.