- Ohio Campus: Nvidia is reportedly discussing a roughly $250 billion guarantee for OpenAI’s proposed lease.
- Financing Split: Separate talks could cover up to $350 billion of Nvidia accelerators, apart from lease and debt support.
- Deal Status: Terms remain unsettled, the arrangement could collapse, and the named parties have not confirmed it.
- Power Buildout: The campus needs 9.2 gigawatts of gas capacity and targets an 800-megawatt first phase in 2028.
Nvidia is reportedly in talks to provide roughly $250 billion in financing guarantees to support OpenAI’s proposed lease of a planned 10-gigawatt data-center campus in Piketon, Ohio. SoftBank-backed developer SB Energy would own and develop the campus, with OpenAI as the proposed tenant. If agreed, the guarantee could give lenders recourse to Nvidia’s credit.
Separate discussions could cover as much as $350 billion of Nvidia accelerators. Terms remain unsettled, and the arrangement could still collapse.
Unnamed people familiar with the discussions supplied the central terms. Nvidia, OpenAI, and the U.S. Commerce Department had not responded to comment requests, and the arrangement had not been independently verified.
How the Backstop Would Shift Credit Risk
Because OpenAI may lack an investment-grade credit rating, SB Energy could borrow on Nvidia’s credit rather than OpenAI’s. Investment-grade credit generally makes debt easier and cheaper to raise. A financing backstop could let lenders seek support from Nvidia if the tenant cannot meet its obligations.
Nvidia could occupy two positions in the buildout: guarantor for OpenAI’s lease and supplier of the accelerators financed for the campus. More installed systems could create hardware sales, while missed tenant payments could leave Nvidia liable under the separate backstop. Without disclosed pricing, duration, collateral, repayment schedules, lender protections, or a final risk split, neither Nvidia’s hardware sales nor its backstop exposure is fixed.
Contract terms would determine how much Nvidia might need to reserve and how lenders price the debt. They would possibly also define loss sharing, repayment triggers, and remedies if OpenAI missed payments. Rights to take over or sublease a site could redirect losses, so the headline amount alone cannot measure Nvidia’s likely exposure.
Even with a large face value, a backstop does not necessarily require an immediate payment. Depending on the contract, Nvidia might incur an obligation only after a missed payment or another defined event. Nvidia’s existing disclosed partner facility lease guarantees carry a $3.5 billion exposure and $712 million escrow, far below the proposed Ohio backstop.
At its January 25 fiscal year-end, Nvidia held $62.6 billion in cash and marketable securities. That balance illustrates the proposal’s scale but does not represent money reserved for a new guarantee.
Nvidia and OpenAI have considered other infrastructure arrangements, but they do not establish the Ohio project’s outcome. An earlier non-binding Nvidia-OpenAI deal came under scrutiny in January, while OpenAI and SB Energy’s earlier Texas project involved a different site.
A 10-Gigawatt Plan Still Starts at 800 Megawatts
Beyond credit risk, power delivery presents a separate condition. SB Energy’s planned PORTS Technology Campus would pair a 10-gigawatt data center with up to 10 gigawatts of new generation, including 9.2 gigawatts of natural-gas capacity.
Electric utility AEP Ohio would also need to complete $4.2 billion of transmission work for the planned campus.
SB Energy plans the campus for Department of Energy land at the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant, where enrichment buildings remain in various stages of demolition. The plant enriched uranium from 1954 until operations ended in 2001. Initial plans tied a $10 billion investment and 4,000 construction jobs to an 800-megawatt data center, plus 300 to 400 planned operating jobs.
An official said existing transmission infrastructure helped attract SB Energy to Piketon, but the developer still plans new lines with AEP Ohio. Ohio state Sen. Shane Wilkin said the project could bring generational change to an economically struggling area, although employment remains contingent on construction. At 800 megawatts, the first stage would cover only a fraction of the planned campus, leaving substantial power and construction work for later phases.
Settled financing, generation, and transmission work will determine whether SB Energy delivers the roughly 800-megawatt first phase in 2028.
