President Trump on Tuesday announced that OpenAI, Oracle and Softbank are partnering on a venture to direct more than $100 billion toward computing infrastructure that will power artificial intelligence in the United States.
“It will ensure the future of technology,” Trump said at a news conference at the White House, where he was joined by executives from the high-profile companies. “What we want to do is we want to keep it in this country. China is a competitor and others are competitors.”
The trio of tech giants is expected to commit an initial $100 billion to the initiative, dubbed the Stargate project, and plan to invest a total of $500 billion in AI infrastructure over the next four years, OpenAI said in a blog post. Trump claimed the effort will quickly create more than 100,000 American jobs and called it a “resounding declaration of confidence in America’s potential under a new president.”
As companies compete globally to build new AI products, the initiative underscores the potential for tech jobs to fuel the U.S. economy. The AI race is increasing the demand worldwide for data centers, facilities that house computing equipment such as servers used to process the trove of information needed to train and maintain AI systems.
Still, questions linger about how Stargate will pan out. Billionaire Elon Musk, who has emerged in recent months as one of Trump’s close advisors and is heading the newly-formed Department of Government Efficiency, publicly challenged the initiative.
“They don’t actually have the money,” Musk posted Tuesday on his social media platform X, formerly Twitter. “SoftBank has well under $10B secured. I have that on good authority.”
On Wednesday, OpenAI Chief Executive Sam Altman fired back on X. “Wrong, as you surely know,” he wrote. “want to come visit the first site already under way? this is great for the country. i realize what is great for the country isn’t always what’s optimal for your companies, but in your new role i hope you’ll mostly put [America] first.”
Musk, who runs an artificial intelligence company, xAI, but was also an early investor in OpenAI, is embroiled in a legal battle with OpenAI and has accused the San Francisco-based company of putting profits over the “benefit of humanity.”
While AI is being put to use to address a seemingly limitless array of challenges including fighting wildfires and diagnosing diseases, concerns remain about the impact the technology will have on jobs, people’s safety and other issues. Trump has downplayed such worries, repealing a 2023 executive order by former President Biden that aimed to place safety guardrails around AI.
Along with SoftBank, OpenAI and Oracle, a technology fund in the United Arab Emirates named MGX will provide funding for Stargate, according to OpenAI’s blog post. Masayoshi Son, the chief executive of SoftBank, will be the chairman of Stargate. Technology partners include Arm, Microsoft and Nvidia.
The first data centers for Stargate are under construction in Texas, Oracle Chief Technology Officer Larry Ellison said at the news conference. It’s unclear whether new data centers will be built in California as part of this effort, but OpenAI’s blog post said that Stargate is looking at potential sites across the United States.
“I’m thrilled we get to do this in the United States of America,” Altman said at the news conference. “I think this will be the most important project of this era.”
