Nvidia is reportedly in advanced discussions to provide approximately $250 billion in financing guarantees to OpenAI as part of a landmark artificial intelligence infrastructure project in the United States, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal. The proposed backing would support the ChatGPT maker's plans to lease a 10-gigawatt data centre campus being developed by SoftBank's energy subsidiary in southern Ohio.

Scale of the Project

The Ohio data centre campus is expected to carry a total price tag of more than $500 billion, encompassing construction costs as well as the Nvidia chips that will power the facility. The proposed $250 billion guarantee from Nvidia would cover the data centre lease and associated debt financing, but would not include the cost of the chips themselves.

Separately, Nvidia is also reportedly in discussions to finance OpenAI's chip purchases worth up to $350 billion — a figure that, if confirmed, would represent one of the largest single procurement commitments in the history of the semiconductor industry.

What This Means for OpenAI

For OpenAI, the arrangement would mark a decisive shift in strategy: moving away from dependence on cloud computing providers such as Microsoft, Amazon, and Oracle, toward owning and controlling its own AI infrastructure. The first phase of the Ohio facility is expected to be completed by 2028, with an initial power capacity of approximately 800 megawatts.

Notably, the power supply for the project is reportedly controlled by the US government and funded separately by Japan under a recent trade agreement linked to Tokyo's commitment to invest $33 billion in a natural gas plant. This underscores the degree to which the project has taken on a geopolitical dimension beyond a standard commercial deal.

Strategic Upside for Nvidia

For Nvidia, the financing arrangement would serve as a mechanism to lock in long-term demand for its AI chips — the backbone of virtually every major AI training and inference workload globally. Securing a committed buyer of this scale would provide revenue visibility that few chip companies have ever enjoyed.

The financing support is also expected to strengthen investment vehicles designed to reassure lenders about the project's funding stability, according to the report.

Broader Collaboration in the Semiconductor Ecosystem

The proposed deal comes amid a broader wave of AI infrastructure dealmaking. Earlier this month, South Korean conglomerates and global technology companies — including Nvidia — agreed to explore collaboration projects with a combined value of approximately $950 billion, according to a senior South Korean presidential official.

Among the proposed initiatives is a long-term agreement under which SK Group would supply around $750 billion worth of high-performance semiconductors to global technology firms including Nvidia. The understanding was reached at a high-level meeting in San Francisco attended by Samsung Electronics Executive Chairman Lee Jae-yong and SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang also participated in the discussions, underscoring the deepening alignment between AI developers and semiconductor manufacturers in building next-generation computing infrastructure.

If the Ohio project proceeds as reported, it would represent one of the most consequential bets on AI infrastructure ever made — and a signal that the race to control the physical layer of artificial intelligence is accelerating rapidly.