OpenAI is planning to build data center campuses in 16 US states, aiming to bolster US artificial intelligence infrastructure. The company is considering Arizona, California, Florida, Louisiana, Maryland, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, Texas, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin and West Virginia.
The project, linked to President Donald Trump's Stargate plans, is a joint venture between OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank. It aims to invest $100 billion to start and up to $500 billion over the next four years.
Construction on the first data center in Abilene, Texas, is already underway. OpenAI expects each campus to generate thousands of jobs, including construction and operational roles.
OpenAI's vice president of global policy, Chris Lehane, said the project is an opportunity to "re-industrialize parts of the country" and help revitalize the American Dream in the "intelligence age."
The company's decision comes amid growing concerns about the pace of AI development in China. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has publicly praised DeepSeek, a Chinese AI startup lab, for its powerful AI model, which was trained at a fraction of the cost of US competitors.
Lehane emphasized the urgency of advancing AI in the US, stating that "right now, there's really only two countries in the world that can build this AI at scale... One is the CCP-led China, and the other is the United States."