OpenAI has secured a massive new partner in its race to build the infrastructure for the next generation of artificial intelligence; NVIDIA has agreed to back the ChatGPT-maker with an investment of up to $100 billion, tied directly to the deployment of new data centres that could enhance the scale of AI computing.
The deal, framed as a strategic partnership, will see OpenAI roll out at least 10 gigawatts of data centre capacity powered by NVIDIA systems. Each stage of deployment will bring about additional investment, with the first gigawatt scheduled to go live in the second half of 2026 on NVIDIA’s Vera Rubin platform.
NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang called the agreement a milestone moment. “NVIDIA and OpenAI have pushed each other for a decade, from the first DGX supercomputer to the breakthrough of ChatGPT. This investment and infrastructure partnership mark the next leap forward—deploying 10 gigawatts to power the next era of intelligence.”
CEO Sam Altman stressed the centrality of computing power to global progress, saying: “Everything starts with compute. Compute infrastructure will be the basis for the economy of the future, and we will utilise what we’re building with NVIDIA to both create new AI breakthroughs and empower people and businesses with them at scale.”
President Greg Brockman added that the company’s growth has always been tied to NVIDIA’s technology. “We’ve been working closely with NVIDIA since the early days of OpenAI. We’ve utilized their platform to create AI systems that hundreds of millions of people use every day. We’re excited to deploy 10 gigawatts of compute with NVIDIA to push back the frontier of intelligence and scale the benefits of this technology to everyone.”
The agreement positions NVIDIA as OpenAI’s preferred partner for computing and networking, ensuring both companies align their hardware and software development to maximise efficiency. This new arrangement adds to OpenAI’s growing ecosystem of collaborators, which already includes Microsoft, Oracle, SoftBank, and other members of the Stargate consortium.
OpenAI’s user base has soared to more than 700 million weekly active users, boosting its demand for computational resources. At the same time, Microsoft, once OpenAI’s exclusive compute partner, has had its role redefined to a first-refusal arrangement. OpenAI has also moved to diversify its infrastructure, recently announcing a $300 billion deal with Oracle to expand cloud capacity.
With Microsoft, OpenAI is betting big on scaling up to the levels it believes are necessary for the development of superintelligence. The final details of the partnership are expected to be settled in the coming weeks.
