Nvidia in talks to back OpenAI's data centre project with $250 billion guarantee: Report

Nvidia is in talks to provide a roughly $250 billion financial guarantee to support OpenAI's lease of a massive data centre project in Ohio, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, citing people familiar with the matter.

According to the report, the guarantee would help OpenAI lease a 10-gigawatt data centre campus being developed in southern Ohio by SoftBank's energy subsidiary.

The overall project, including Nvidia chips to be installed at the site, could cost more than $500 billion, making it the largest announced data centre project to date, the newspaper said.

The report said Nvidia's backing would help the developer secure debt on more favourable terms, as OpenAI, an unprofitable private company, does not have an investment-grade credit rating.

The proposed guarantee would cover the lease and debt required to build the facility, but not the Nvidia chips to be installed there, the report said. Nvidia is also discussing a separate arrangement to finance OpenAI's chip purchases, which could total about $350 billion, according to the WSJ.

The newspaper said the terms of the proposed financing have not been finalised and the deal could still fall through.

The first phase of the project, expected to provide about 800 megawatts of capacity, is targeted for completion in 2028, according to the report.

The Wall Street Journal also reported that the project has backing from the US and Japanese governments under a recent trade agreement. It said US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is involved in decisions on allocating power for the project, while Japan has committed $33 billion toward a natural gas power project on federal land in Ohio to support the development.

The report said OpenAI has been in advanced talks to lease the site for several weeks, while Anthropic, Microsoft and Google have also expressed interest.