By Steve Holland

(Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday announced a private sector investment of up to $500 billion to fund infrastructure for artificial intelligence, aiming to overtake rival countries in critical technology. in business.

Trump said ChatGPT creator OpenAI, SoftBank (TYO: ) and Oracle (NYSE: ) are planning a joint venture called Stargate, which he said will build data centers and create more than 100,000 jobs. in the United States.

These companies, along with Stargate’s other equity backers, have committed $100 billion for immediate deployment, with the remaining investment expected to occur over the next four years.

SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Oracle Chairman Larry Ellison joined Trump at the White House for the launch.

The first of the project’s data centers has been built in Texas, Ellison said at the press conference. Twenty will be built, half a million square feet each, he said. The project will power AI that analyzes electronic health records and helps doctors care for their patients, Ellison said.

Executives gave Trump credit for the news. “We can’t decide to do this,” Anak told Trump, “unless you win.”

“For AGI to be built here,” Altman said, referring to a more powerful technology called artificial general intelligence, “we couldn’t have done it without you, Mr. President.”

It was not immediately clear if the announcement was an update on a reported business.

In March 2024, The Information, a technology news website, reported OpenAI and Microsoft (NASDAQ: ) were working on plans for a $100 billion data center project that would include an artificial intelligence supercomputer called also “Stargate” which is scheduled to launch in 2028.

HUNGRY FOR DATA CENTERS

The announcement on Trump’s second day in office follows the rollback of former President Joe Biden’s executive order on AI, which was intended to reduce the risks AI poses to consumers, workers and national security.

AI requires a lot of computing power, driving the need for specialized data centers that allow tech companies to link thousands of chips in clusters.

“They need to be able to produce a lot of electricity, and we’re going to make it possible for them to quickly finish production at their own plants if they want to,” Trump said.

As US power consumption rises from AI data centers and the electrification of buildings and transportation, nearly half of the country is at increased risk of power supply shortages in the next decade, North American Electric (NASDAQ:) Reliability Corporation said in December.

As a candidate in 2016, Trump promised to push a $1 trillion infrastructure bill through Congress but didn’t. He often discussed the subject in his first term as president from 2017 to 2021, but never gave a big investment, and “Infrastructure Week” became the punchline.

Oracle shares rose 7% on the project’s initial report earlier in the day. Nvidia (NASDAQ:), ARMS Holdings (NASDAQ: ) and Dell (NYSE: ) shares also rose.

Investment in AI has increased since OpenAI launched ChatGPT in 2022, as companies across sectors seek to integrate artificial intelligence into their products and services.