Sam Altman, the boss of OpenAI, had pulled out all the stops and big words to justify launching the Stargate project. This $500 billion infrastructure is to build 20 data centers on American soil over the next four years. It is about nothing less than "supporting the reindustrialization of the United States" and offering "a strategic capability to protect the national security of America and its allies".
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But according to sources at the Financial Times, this grandiloquent project will mainly serve the interests of OpenAI. "The goal is not to become a provider of data centers for the entire world, it's for OpenAI", declared one of them. The creator of ChatGPT can no longer rely on the computing power of its partner Microsoft.
For several months now, the start-up has been looking for a way to accelerate its access to additional computing power, which is essential to achieve its goal: to create artificial intelligence capable of rivaling, or even surpassing, the human brain. Not an exciting prospect, but it is the new hobby horse of Silicon Valley.
The only problem is that building the necessary infrastructure requires a lot of money, hence the Stargate project announced at the White House, in the presence of a Donald Trump only too happy to trumpet a project supposed to repatriate jobs to the United States and make the country a leader in AI. However, the details are sorely lacking. Also according to the FT, Stargate's promoters "have not yet defined the structure, they have not settled the financing, and they do not have the funds committed."
"They do not have the money," accused a jealous Elon Musk. "SoftBank has much less than $10 billion secured. I am certain of that, on good authority," he added. Sam Altman replied, in a childish argument that only big tech bosses know the secret to, that it was "false, as you probably know."
A first tranche of $100 billion is supposed to be released "immediately." SoftBank and OpenAI must raise $15 billion from their investors and by generating debt. SoftBank will also inject existing funds into the project. For its part, Microsoft has announced investments of $80 billion for AI infrastructure, but unrelated to Stargate.
The first dedicated data center is under construction in Texas. Oracle is funding the equivalent of $7 billion in chips for the site, and will provide computing power to OpenAI.
Source: Financial Times
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