$NVDA (+0.28%) has secured, together with SB Energy (a subsidiary of SoftBank $SFTBY (+2.57%)), secured the land, power connection, and building shell for a new data center project at the PORTS-Pike Campus in Pike County, Ohio.
The roles are clearly defined: SB Energy will build, own, and operate the data center and lease it to OpenAI for 20 years. NVIDIA is providing credit support for the expansion, investing $1.5 billion in SB Energy, and supplying the GPU chips.
The first phase includes 4.25 IT-GW of computing power, with the option to expand to a total of 8 GW.
This makes NVIDIA itself a “neocloud”:
The company is installing its chips in the leased building shells to lease the computing capacity exclusively to OpenAI.
What happens if OpenAI doesn’t use this facility?
NVIDIA says that, alternatively, the capacity can simply be subleased, making the compute a “profitable and financeable” asset.
This is literally the financial thesis behind Neoclouds: $CRWV (+1.88%), $IREN (+4.75%) and $NBIS (+0.13%) they raise billions in debt, secured against GPU and data center assets—based precisely on the bet that this capacity will retain a residual value and remain available for subleasing.
For the Neocloud industry, this deal has two sides:
First: With these exclusive locations, NVIDIA becomes a direct competitor—the manufacturer secures the best property, the tenant, and the financing for itself, rather than leaving them to a Neocloud provider.
Second: At the same time, the chip manufacturer—of all companies—is publicly endorsing the residual value logic on which the entire model is based—and is even guaranteeing the financing.
In my view, the concern is justified:
If NVIDIA itself acts as a Neocloud provider, potential partners will become competitors. Nevertheless, the deal can also be seen as a positive sign—if the manufacturer backs the interchangeability and residual value thesis with its own capital, that is the strongest conceivable seal of approval for the very business model on which CoreWeave, IREN and Nebius are built on.