Nvidia is in discussions to provide roughly USD 250 billion in financing guarantees for OpenAI as part of a massive data center project being developed in southern Ohio, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The arrangement would represent one of the largest infrastructure financing commitments in the technology industry's history and signals a deepening interdependence between two of the most powerful companies in the artificial intelligence sector.

The Structure of the Deal

The USD 250 billion backstop from Nvidia would help OpenAI lease a 10-gigawatt project being developed by SoftBank's energy subsidiary in southern Ohio.

Separately, Nvidia is also discussing financing OpenAI's chip purchases worth up to $350 billion, the Journal reported. Nvidia's backing is intended to support financing vehicles designed to reassure lenders about the overall funding of the project, according to the report.

The total cost of the project, including the chips inside the data center, is expected to exceed USD 500 billion.

What Is at Stake for OpenAI and Nvidia

For OpenAI, the deal would represent a significant strategic shift. The company currently relies on Microsoft, Amazon, and Oracle to provide cloud infrastructure, and securing control of its own data center would mark its first move toward owning and operating independent computing resources.

The move would reduce OpenAI's dependence on external providers for the infrastructure that underpins its products, including its widely used ChatGPT service.

For Nvidia, the arrangement serves a different but equally strategic purpose.

By providing financing guarantees, Nvidia would lock in guaranteed demand for its chips for years into the future.

The chipmaker has become the dominant supplier of graphics processing units used in AI model training and inference, and a long-term commitment of this scale would further cement its position at the center of the AI hardware supply chain.

Timeline and Scale of the Project

The first phase of the project is expected to be completed in 2028, with approximately 800 megawatts of power capacity at that stage.

The full project is sized at 10 gigawatts, making it one of the most ambitious data center developments ever announced. The power supply for the facility is controlled by the U.S. government and is being funded separately by Japan as part of a recent trade deal.

That arrangement is tied to Tokyo's pledge to invest USD 33 billion in a natural gas plant. U.S.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is involved in deciding which companies gain access to that power.

Competition for Access to the Site

OpenAI is not the only company with its eye on the project. The Journal reported that OpenAI has been in advanced talks for several weeks to lease the site and is among the companies showing the strongest interest.

Other major technology firms, including Anthropic, Microsoft, and Google, have also spoken with Commerce Secretary Lutnick in recent weeks about the project, according to the report.

The involvement of so many leading AI companies underscores how critical large-scale computing infrastructure has become in the race to develop and deploy advanced artificial intelligence systems.

Access to sufficient power and processing capacity has emerged as one of the key constraints limiting the pace of AI development across the industry.

Broader Shift in AI Infrastructure Financing

The potential deal reflects a wider transformation in how technology companies are funding their AI ambitions. Rather than relying solely on corporate balance sheets or venture capital, firms are increasingly turning to debt and equity markets to finance the enormous cost of building AI infrastructure.

A $250 billion financing guarantee from a single chip supplier, combined with an additional USD 350 billion in potential chip purchase financing, would together represent a commitment that dwarfs the annual capital expenditure of most major corporations.

SoftBank's energy subsidiary is developing the Ohio site, and the project fits within a pattern of Japanese investment in U.S.

AI and technology infrastructure that has gained prominence in the context of recent trade negotiations between Washington and Tokyo.