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Data Centers

Infrastructure Buildout Proposal

Spacex Launches

U.S. President Trump on 20 Aug 2026 signed a memo to help drastically increase the number of U.S. commercial space launches, including directing government agencies to look at federal land for new launch and re-entry sites. The White House wants to enable at least 1,000 launches and re-entries annually by 2030, up from 178 launches last year - a figure that is already 10 times higher than in 2013 and dominated by Elon Musk's ✅ SpaceX (SPCX). The memo, focused on boosting the commercial space industry, called on agencies to incentivize co-development of space transportation infrastructure with private sector partners, expedite permitting and environmental reviews and ensure adequate wireless spectrum for space launches. In May 2026 the head of the Federal Aviation Administration said SpaceX aimed to reach 10,000 annual launches (an average of around 28 launches per day) within 5 years. Trump also wants agencies to refrain from conducting U.S. government space transportation activities "that preclude, discourage, or compete with United States commercial space transportation activities, unless required by public safety or national security." [Reuters: 21 Aug 2026].

Interviews, Presentations, Updates

⏯️ Elon Musk: WEF Jan 2026

⏯️ Jensen Huang: WEF Jan 2026

⏯️ Jensen Huang: Jun 2026

⏯️ Elon Musk: Aug 2026

ASX-Listed Data Centers

Data center providers listed in the ASX in Aug 2026 include:

News

✅ Amazon Will Buy GlobalStar to Compete With ✅ Spacex

✅ Amazon has said it will acquire Globalstar in a USD 11.57 billion deal, bolstering its fledgling satellite business as it tries to catch up with Elon Musk's Starlink. Amazon will add Globalstar's two dozen satellites to its existing network of more than 200.

Australian Federal Government’s National AI Plan

The Australian Federal Government has released its National AI Plan [December 2025]

Key extracts include

"Australia is an active and influential player in the global AI ecosystem, consistently punching above our weight in research and innovation:

  • "Australia ranks highly in AI use by consumers. After adjusting for population size, Australia ranks third globally in the use of Claude, a popular AI tool developed by leading technology company Anthropic.
  • "Australia attracted $10 billion in data centre investment during 2024, making it the second-largest destination globally that year for this asset class after the United States (Knight Frank 2025).
  • Our AI industry is thriving, with more than 1,500 companies driving growth and innovation nationwide.
  • Australia produces 1.9% of the world’s AI research publications, far exceeding our share of global population and GDP. Our research extends beyond core computer science and into practical, discipline-specific applications including in medicine, environmental science, agriculture and the social sciences.
  • In 2024, Australia attracted $700 million in private investment in AI firms, reflecting increasing momentum in developing and deploying Australian AI solutions (Bratanova et al. 2025).
  • Demand for AI-skilled workers has tripled since 2015, underscoring Australia’s position as a hub for cutting-edge technology and talent.

Key actions

  • Build Smart Infrastructure
    • "Between 2023 and 2025, companies announced plans to make investments in Australian data centres that could scale up to more than $100 billion. Both international and domestic data centre operators have been investing heavily to expand Australian capacity. Investor enthusiasm is high. As Knight Frank reported, in 2024 Australia ranked second globally (after the US) as a data centre investment destination (Knight Frank 2025).
    • "Two components are critical to support AI at scale:
      • high-quality computing power (compute) infrastructure and
      • robust digital connectivity: high-speed networks, fibre-optic connectivity and resilient telecommunications systems."
    • A set of national data centre principles in partnership with the states and territories, to clarify what it looks like for investment in data centres to align with Australia’s overall national interests. These principles will set clear expectations for sustainability and other factors, including bringing new renewable energy online and adopting efficient cooling technologies. Where investments align with the data centre principles, the government is exploring opportunities to coordinate data centre approval processes with states and territories, as part of our broader efforts to make it easier to develop major, transformational projects and invest in Australia.

Macquarie Asset Management and UBS are helping Macquarie’s infrastructure investing unit prepare a non-binding indicative offer for Stack’s data centers. Stack offers a platform with data centers in Sydney, Melbourne, Malaysia and Japan with USD 1.3 billion (AUD 1.8 billion) contracted earnings – higher than AirTrunk’s figures at the time of its AUD 24 billion sale to Blackstone and Canada Pension Plan in 2024. [AFR: 19 Aug 2026]

🇺🇸 SoftBank+Nvidia+OpenAI PORTS-Pike Technology Campus

🇺🇸 ✅ Nvidia has agreed to spend as much as USD 105 billion (AUD 148 billion) to support a new data center campus - the largest to date - in Ohio set to be exclusively leased by OpenAI. Nvidia guarantees SoftBank's SB Energy’s 🇺🇸 PORTS-Pike Technology Campus in Ohio to exclusively host Nvidia AI Compute.SB Energy. WSJ.

PORTS-Pike Technology Campus in Pike County, Ohio, working with SB Energy, NVIDIA, and the U.S. Department of Energy.

🔺 PORTS-Pike data center, Ohio

However Reuters: 17 Aug 2026 quotes WSJ that Nvidia is scaling back its USD 250 billion funding guarantee for the Ohio OpenAI data center. [Reuters: 15 Aug 2026]

✅ Nvidia announced that it has secured land, power and shell (LPS) capacity through a partnership with SB Energy at the PORTS-Pike Technology Campus in Pike County, Ohio, to host Nvidia compute. OpenAI will be the customer. SB Energy will build, own and operate the data center under a 20-year lease to OpenAI. [AFR 17 Aug 2026]

✅ Nvidia will be the exclusive AI compute infrastructure provider at PORTS-Pike. Nvidia will provide credit support on land, power, and shell buildout to secure initial 4.25 IT-GW, with an option to take the remaining 3.75 IT-GW. OpenAI will be the customer for the 8-IT GW PORTS-Pike Technology Campus that will create tens of thousands of Ohio jobs, pay for its power infrastructure, and invest hundreds of millions in the community anchored by an initial USD 80 million community benefits fund. Nvidia will invest USD 1.5B in SB Energy now to support SB Energy’s growth and commitments to the Ohio community. [Nvidia: 17 Aug 2026]

🇺🇸 OpenAI said on 17 Aug 2026 it has entered into an agreement to secure up to roughly 8 gigawatts of computing capacity from the PORTS-Pike Technology Campus, with the first 800 megawatts expected to come online by 2028.

🇦🇺 AUSTRALIA: NSW Investment Delivery Authority (IDA)

🇦🇺 The NSW Government fast-tracks major data center proposals through its Investment Delivery Authority (IDA), endorsing 15 key digital infrastructure projects worth AUD 51.9 billion in March 2026. This fast-track plan provides a dedicated concierge service, multi-agency taskforce support, and streamlined planning assessments while targeting strict sustainability and resource standards. [AFR: 13 Aug 2026]

Fast-Track Plan Details:

  • Endorsed Projects: 15 out of 48 submissions received fast-track status, including major proposals from operators like ✅ Microsoft, ✅ NEXTDC, Goodman, and Stockland.
  • Rejected Proposals: Roughly $40.7 billion worth of competing applications were set aside as premature or overly speculative.
  • Support Mechanism: Backed by the Premier’s Department Investment Taskforce, offering specialized planning teams to speed up delivery.
  • Key Conditions & Focus Areas: Sustainability Rules: Proponents must address intensive grid-connected power and water cooling demands.
  • Community Standards: Projects face tighter expectations regarding social licence, minimizing diesel backup generator reliance, and aligning with local industrial land usage.
  • Oversight: The fast-track push runs parallel to a broader NSW Legislative Council inquiry scrutinizing the cumulative strain on state energy and water grids.

Less than 2 years after Macquarie Asset Management landed an AUD 24 billion exit at AirTrunk, its dealmakers are weighing a bid for parts of Stack Infrastructure. [AFR: 13 Aug 2026]

🇺🇸 THESEUS INFRASTRUCTURE

Anthropic, 🇦🇺 Macquarie Asset Management, and 🇸🇬 Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC announced on 10 Aug 2026 a strategic partnership to establish Theseus Infrastructure, a new platform to develop, operate and lease data center infrastructure at scale to Anthropic under long-term agreements. Each facility will be purpose-built to support Anthropic's growing capacity needs as a leader in AI innovation. [Macquarie Asset Management: 10 Aug 2026]

🇦🇺 Macquarie Asset Management will finance billions of dollars of new data centers in USA for Anthropic as the it seeks more computing power before a $1.4 trillion public listing. GIC, which is already funding US data centers in partnership with Nasdaq-listed developer Equinix and the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board, will also contribute financing to Theseus Infrastructure. [AFR 11 Aug 2026]

🇦🇺 New data centers built in Australia will be barred from using large volumes of drinking water to cool their huge computer servers under proposed federal government rules designed to protect water supplies and limit the impact on household bills. The Labor Party (ALP) proposal, which will be presented to state environment ministers on 14 Aug 2026, will require data centers to prioritise the use of recycled water and pay for new public infrastructure needed to meet their water needs. [AFR: 14 Aug 2026]
TechInvestment comment: The data center developers should use water cooling radiators or convection (if near a river). A ✅ Spacex StarMind orbital data center, designated as the AI1 satellite, resembles a massive spacecraft with a 70-meter wingspan (wider than a Boeing 747) and a height of 20 meters. The design features a central rack of AI chips flanked by huge solar panels for power and deployable liquid radiators spanning up to 110 square meters to dissipate heat into the vacuum of space.

🇺🇸 A consortium of groups including Apollo Global Management, Blackstone, BlackRock, Brookfield Asset Management, Goldman Sachs and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co (KKR) is entering a partnership with ✅ Nvidia to invest USD 500 billion (AUD709 billion) in AI infrastructure development. "New financing platforms turn ✅ Nvidia compute and full-stack AI infrastructure into an investable asset class for global capital, broadening access to AI Factories, enabling long-duration usage-linked revenue while supporting ✅ Nvidia’s ecosystem growth across hardware sales and software adoption" [✅ Nvidia: 10 Aug 2026]

Forbes emphasises that "These are memorandums of understanding, not signed contracts, and ✅ Nvidia said each project still needs a final agreement. There's no timeline yet, no word on how the money splits among the six firms, and no first project named. The USD 500 billion is a target for capital to be raised over time. It isn't Nvidia's revenue, and it isn't one fund or one customer. The likely borrowers are AI labs, big enterprises, and the cloud companies that rent out computing. Nvidia says the six firms will judge each deal on their own. They weigh the customer's demand, how hard the hardware runs, the cash it makes, and what it's worth secondhand. Nvidia supplies the computing platform; the investors decide what to fund. That lets Nvidia expand its customers' buying power without putting every project on its own balance sheet." Forbes 10 Aug 2026

🇺🇸 REUTERS DATA CENTERS NEWS UPDATES

🇺🇸 Shares of CoreWeave and Super Micro Computer jumped to their highest since June on 12 Aug 2026 after upbeat forecasts from the two AI infrastructure companies signaled booming demand for computing capacity. Both companies have been beneficiaries of the insatiable demand for AI infrastructure as data center operators build out the hardware needed for generative-AI workloads. [Reuters: 12 Aug 2026]

🇦🇺 In Australia, GDP grew by 2.5% over the year to the Mar 2026 quarter. Private demand remained the main driver of growth over the year, underpinned by continued growth in consumption and elevated levels of business investment. The strong growth in business investment was largely driven by investment in data centers. More recently, partial data suggest that consumption growth moderated only modestly in the June 2026 quarter, as expected in the May 2026 Statement. This is a more resilient picture than that suggested by consumer sentiment, which remains very weak. [Reserve Bank of Australia: Aug 2026

🇦🇺 Sydney’s Leading Edge Data Centers, a 7-year-old player backed by NYSE-listed DigitalBridge and Soul Patts, is courting investors after pivoting the business to serve the booming neocloud sector. LEDC, which focuses on regional data centers in NSW, is in the final stages of raising about $80 million to expand its Newcastle operations. [AFR: 11 Aug 2026]

🇺🇸 The world’s largest financial groups are working with ✅ Nvidia to assemble a funding package of more than USD 500 billion (AUD 709 billion) for AI infrastructure development, in one of Wall Street’s most ambitious lending efforts to date. A consortium of groups including Apollo Global, Blackstone, BlackRock, Brookfield Asset Management, Goldman Sachs and KKR is entering a partnership with ✅ Nvidia to invest in the AI build-out. [AFR: 11 Aug 2026].

🌎 Global AI investment is forecast to exceed USD 1 trillion in 2026 [Goldman Sachs: 7 Aug 2026]. Brookfield Asset Management has announced the launch of a USD 100 billion global AI Infrastructure program in partnership with Nvidia and the Kuwait Investment Authority.

🇺🇸 Towns and counties have been at the forefront of opposition to data center projects that in some cases have been greenlit with local officials signing non-disclosure agreements with towns and counties have been at the forefront of opposition to data center projects that in some cases have been greenlit with local officials signing non-disclosure agreements with developers despite resident pushback or a lack of regulatory scrutiny. Now politicians at the state and national level are scrambling to keep pace with rising voter anger over the threat of higher power bills, the diversion of precious water resources and pollution.

🇺🇸 Data center opposition is among the few issues uniting Americans across ideological lines, with just a third of Americans approving of the pace of data-center construction in the U.S., according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll [11 Jun 2026]. Only 14% of respondents would support a data center being built in their community to support artificial intelligence projects for technology firms such as ✅ Meta, ✅ Alphabet [GOOG/L], ✅ Amazon, ✅ Microsoft and Elon Musk's xAI. [Reuters: 18 Jul 2026]

🇺🇸 Blackstone (NYSE: BX) has announced a joint venture with ✅ Google to create a new US-based company that will offer efficient data center capacity, operations, networking, and ✅ Google Cloud

’s Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) as a TPU Cloud compute-as-a-service offering. The company will give customers another option to access cloud TPUs in addition to using them through ✅ Google Cloud."[Blackstone: 18 May 2026]

🇺🇸 Madison Air Solutions (NYSE: MAIR), which provides heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems for data centers, closed its IPO on 17 Apr 2026 at USD 27.00 [10 May 2026] and then rose to USD 42.02. [Barrons: 11 May 2026]

🔺 ✅ Amazon has acquired George Washington University's Virginia data center [Reuters: 2 Mar 2026]

Data Centers in Earth Orbit

✅ Amazon + GlobalStar

GlobalStar [NASDAQ: GSAT] 2025 Annual Report. Dr. Paul E. Jacobs, GlobalStar's CEO: “Throughout the year, we have made significant progress with our satellite and ground station partners and are now poised to deploy not only the satellites to replenish our existing constellation but also extend our reach with our third-generation system.

✅ Amazon launched its first low Earth orbit satellites into space last year for Amazon LEO, formerly Project Kuiper. The company planned to invest USD10 billion in building its constellation in 2020, but it's about to more than double its budget for the project.

Globalstar [NASDAQ: GSAT] has entered into a Definitive Agreement to be acquired by ✅ Amazon for about USD 11.6 billion [GlobalStar: 14 Apr 2026]

⏯️ How ✅ Nvidia GPUs Compare To ✅ Google’s And ✅ ✅ Amazon AWS AI Chips [CNBC]

🇺🇸 Spacex + x.AI

✅ SpaceX has acquired X.AI Corp, maker of the Grok large language model and owner of the X social network. [The Batch: 13 Feb 2026] The merged company is called Spacex AI.

x

🇺🇸 ⏯️ ✅ SpaceX preparing to launch a data center into Earth orbit. [⏯️ WAI: 10 Apr 2026]
The economic justification is based on reducing costs of energy and heat dissipation.

🇦🇺 Sydney-based Pengana Capital Group (PCG.AX) has doubled the valuation of Elon Musk’s ✅ SpaceX to USD 800 billion (AUD 1.1 trillion), with its prized stake expected to generate big returns for Pengana as ✅ SpaceX prepares for a blockbuster initial public offering (IPO) in June-July 2026. Pengana previously valued the hotly anticipated IPO at USD 400 billion, but has doubled its valuation to USD 800 billion following a secondary share sale in Dec 2025. In Apr 2026 suggested its secondary share sale for ✅ SpaceX would value the company at USD 1.5 trillion (AUD 2.1 trillion) [Pengana, Inside Adviser: 16 Apr 2026]

⏯️ Elon Musk merged ✅ SpaceX and xAI in late Jan / early Feb 2026, with plans for space-based AI data centers. Musk says solar powered and space-based data centers are the only way to meet AI’s burgeoning energy demands. [More about the merger: WSJ 5 Feb 2026] [xAI: 12 Feb 2026]

To achieve this, ✅ SpaceX wants to launch a constellation of 1 million satellites that will orbit Earth and harness the sun to power AI data centers, according to an 18 Sep 2025 filing at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and GN Docket No. 25-302. [⏯️ WAI]

The filing was made by:

This filing has been accepted by the FCC for filing: 30 Sep 2025

Other Proposed Orbital Data Centers

Companies (in addition to Spacex) with credible proposals for orbital data centers include:

  • Globalstar: ✅ Amazon will buy satellite firm Globalstar. Globalstar's satellite network is designed for reliable, low-data connections directly to mobile devices, or Direct-to-Device (D2D). D2D removes the need for devices to connect to ground-based cellular towers, making them crucial in powering emergency services and delivering connectivity in areas with limited cellular coverage. The deal will help ✅ Amazon deploy D2D from 2028.
  • Aetherflux, a space-based solar technology company's project which aims to speed up artificial intelligence data center production processes by launching a constellation of solar-powered satellites. Its proposed constellation of satellites dubbed “Galactic Brain” working together will scale the next generation of compute workloads in orbit. The first data center node for commercial use is targeted for Q1 2027.[Space.com: 9 Dec 2026]
  • StarMind, ✅ SpaceX and ✅ Nvidia are taking artificial intelligence beyond Earth, unveiling plans to build a satellite designed to perform advanced AI computing directly in orbit. The companies announced on 4 Aug 2026 that they are jointly developing the compute payload for the StarMind AI1, a spacecraft intended to process AI workloads in low Earth orbit using Nvidia’s latest computing hardware. The project reaches far beyond a single satellite. SpaceX envisions an orbital network that could eventually grow to one million satellites, creating what would amount to a distributed AI supercomputer in space. If realized, the constellation would dramatically expand computing capacity outside Earth’s data centers and rely on laser links to move data between satellites at extremely high speeds.[Interesting Engineering: 4 Aug 2026] [⏯️ Elon Musk: About Starmind 5 Aug 2026]

Other Potential Solar Powered Data Centers

Google SunCatcher Orbital DataCenter ✅ Google's Project Suncatcher consists of a constellation of networked satellites, likely operating in a dawn–dusk sun-synchronous low earth orbit, where they would be exposed to near-constant sunlight. This orbital choice maximizes solar energy collection and reduces the need for heavy onboard batteries. [Google: 4 Nov 2025]

🔺 Apple Suncatcher Orbital Data Center [Image by AeroNaut]

Arguments FOR Orbital Data Centers ... and Early Steps

Some arguments from proponents, supporters and implementers of extra-terrestrial data centers [Ezra Feilden, Adi Oltean, Philip Johnston: Starcloud team: Sep 2024]:

  • “We still don’t appreciate the energy needs of this technology…there’s no way to get there without a breakthrough…we need fusion or we need radically cheaper solar plus storage or something” - Sam Altman
  • “We have silicon shortage today, a voltage step down transformer shortage probably in about a year, and then just electricity shortages in general in about two years” - Elon Musk
  • “We would build out bigger clusters than we currently can if we could get the energy to do it” - Mark Zuckerberg
  • “The amount of power to run compute by 2045 will be the base power of the planet right now. The drain on resources is so high, you need to put that compute in space and use the power of the sun … that’s a really good use of space to help save the planet” - Tom Mueller, former employee #1: CTO of Propulsion at SpaceX, now founder and CEO of Impulse Space.
  • “The results of the European Commission's ASCEND study confirm that deploying data centers in space offers a more eco-friendly solution for hosting and processing data.” - Christophe Valorge, CTO at Thales Alenia Space

✅ TED Lecture: Spacex

⏯️ TED Lecture: Philip Johnston [Reuters/ChatGPT]

✅ Amazon/Blue Origin

Blue Origin has been working on technology for AI data centers in space, building on Jeff Bezos' prediction that giant gigawatt data centers in orbit could beat the cost of their Earth-bound peers within 10 to 20 years by tapping uninterrupted solar power and radiating heat directly into space.

Starcloud

Starcloud has already offered a glimpse of that future: its 60KG Starcloud-1 satellite, launched on a ✅ Spacex Falcon 9 rocket on 2 Nov 2025, carries an ✅ Nvidia H100 - the most powerful AI chip ever placed in orbit - and is training and running ✅ Google’s open‑source ✅ Google’s open large language model (LLM), Gemma, as a proof of concept.

Progress & Developments:

🔺 This project marks the first time a high-powered AI model has been operated in space. [Starcloud White Paper, Sep 2024]

The company ultimately envisions a modular “hypercluster” of satellites providing about 5 gigawatts of computing power, comparable to several hyperscale data centers combined. [Reuters/ChatGPT] [White Paper: Aug 2024]

Update

🔺 Spacex orbital data centers

✅ Amazon AWS Outposts

Space data center startup Starcloud has revealed plans to launch ✅ Amazon Web Services (AWS) on-prem/Edge offering, ✅ AWS Outposts, in space, as well as its long-term goal of an 88,000-satellite constellation. [GitHub White Paper: Sep 2024 ]

Co-founder and CEO of Starcloud, Philip Johnston, revealed the partnership with ✅ AWS in a LinkedIn post on 9 Feb 2026. I am excited to share that Starcloud will be the first to launch the ✅ AWS Outpost hardware to space on our second satellite launching in October 2026, further enabling high-performance computing in space!

Amazon Web Services (AWS) Outposts are rack and server-level offerings from ✅ AWS, enabling customers to bring ✅ AWS Outpost capabilities to their own data center or Edge location. Launched in 2018, the Amazon unveiled a new generation in April 2025 that could support AWS' seventh-generation x86-powered ✅ Amazon EC2 Electronic Cloud Compute EC2 instances, beginning with the C7i compute-optimized instances, C7i general-purpose instances, and R7i memory-optimized instances. About instance types.

🇦🇺 Stack Infrastructure

🇦🇺 Stack Infrastructure, owned by Blue Owl Capital [NYSE:OWL], has said that its up-for-sale Asia Pacific arm has locked down an 864MW contract, with ✅ Amazon Web Services said to be the leaseholder.

🇦🇺 Stack has data centers in Sydney and Melbourne. It also has data centers in 10 US cities, 3 in Asia Pacific, 7 in Europe, 10 is US cities and 1 in Canada.

🇺🇸 Vantage Data Centers

Vantage Data Centers, a hyperscale developer and operator, is exploring options including an IPO or sale as soon as 2027, according to people familiar with the matter, as AI-driven demand lifts data center valuations and fuels dealmaking. Vantage, backed by private equity firm Silver Lake Technology Management, LLC and infrastructure investor DigitalBridge Group could raise around USD 10 billion and pursue a stock market listing at a valuation of about USD 100 billion, which would make it the largest data center IPO to date. [Reuters: 13 Aug 2026]

🇺🇸 ✅ Spacex

Spacex is seeking Federal Communications Commission approval for a satellite constellation of unprecedented scale intended to function as an orbital data center.

Orbital Data Centers may be maintained by NASA's Integrated System for Autonomous and Adaptive Caretaking (ISAAC), which is a project aimed at developing autonomous robots to maintain space stations. The ISAAC project, based at NASA’s Ames Research Center and Johnson Space Center, developed technology for autonomous caretaking of spacecraft, primarily during uncrewed mission phases. ISAAC aimed to integrate autonomous intra-vehicular robots with vehicle infrastructure.

🇺🇸 Elon Musk Merges XAI with Spacex

As of March 2026, SpaceX has acquired AI startup xAI, creating a combined entity valued at approximately USD 1.25 trillion to USD 1.8 trillion. This merged entity plans to pursue an IPO later in 2026, aiming to develop space-based AI data centers using Starlink. The move combines profitable rocket tech with high-cash-need AI. [KraneShares: 11 Jan 2026]

🇺🇸 Anthropic on said it reached a deal to tap the computing resources of Elon Musk's SpaceX, marking a détente with its one-time critic and a boost for both companies in the high-stakes artificial intelligence race. Under the agreement, Anthropic will use the full computing power of the SpaceX Colossus 1 facility in Memphis, Tennessee, which houses more than 220,000 ✅ Nvidia (NVDA.O) processors and will give the Claude chatbot maker 300 megawatts of new capacity within a month. [Reuters: 6 May 2026]

Arguments AGAINST Orbital Data Centers

ChatGPT offers the following comments on some issues involved in a space-based data center:

  • Cooling would be by thermal radiation (infrared radiation into space). That would require thermal radiation (infrared radiation into space), and huge radiator panels. To reject 1 MW of heat may require thousands of square meters of radiator area.
  • Orbit is a harsh radiation environment with threats from cosmic rays, solar particle events, and trapped radiation belts (depending on orbit), cosmic rays.
  • Impacts on hardware: bit flips in memory, silent data corruption, degradation of transistors over time, reduced chip lifespan
  • Launch issues ... however Spacex offers mature technology

Data bandwidth and latency

Round trip Earth surface to data centers (DC) in orbit, or moon, or Mars (calculated by ChatGPT):

  • Earth terrestrial: distance: 1,000 km fiber): about 20–50 ms RTT
  • GEO satellite: distance: 36,000 km): about 250 ms RTT
  • Lunar: distance: 384,000 km): about 2.5 s RTT
  • Mars: distance: 225,000,000 km): about 25 min RTT average.

In summary, ChatGPT outlines the following issues for orbital data centers - in descending order of difficulty:

🇺🇸 Stargaze Orbital Risk Management System

SpaceX has developed a novel Space Situational Awareness (SSA) system, called Stargaze, that significantly enhances the safety and sustainability of satellite operations in low Earth orbit (LEO), and its screening data will be made available to the broader satellite operator community free of charge in the coming weeks.

Practices such as leaving rocket bodies in LEO, operators maneuvering their satellites without sharing trajectory predictions or coordinating with other active satellites, and countries conducting anti-satellite tests—have heightened the risk of collision, necessitating improvements in space-traffic coordination. Conventional methods typically observe objects only a limited number of times per day, causing large uncertainties in orbital predictions, further compounded by volatile space weather. [Spacex]

Stargaze delivers a several-order-of-magnitude increase in detection capability compared to conventional ground-based systems. Stargaze uses data collected from nearly 30,000 star trackers, each of which makes continuous observations of nearby objects, resulting in approximately 30 million transits detected daily across the fleet. Reuters 13 Feb 2026

Lunar

People: 🚀 Artemis 2: 🌖 2 April 2026

❗️ NASA Artemis 2 launched 4 astronauts on a 10-day voyage around the moon ion 2 April 2026. The mission's purpose was to validate Orion, SLS and the mission operations needed for future landings. While Artemis 1 successfully flew Orion around the moon without astronauts in 2022, Artemis 2 was the first time humans travel aboard the spacecraft and venture beyond low Earth orbit in more than 50 years.

During the mission, astronauts travelled thousands of miles beyond the moon, experienced deep-space radiation, and tested life-support, navigation and communications systems in real flight conditions.

Artemis 2 did not land on the moon. Instead, it served as a critical stepping stone toward future Artemis missions that aim to put astronauts on the lunar surface later in the decade.

12,000 Artemis 2 photos

Landing Attempts: iSpace, Intuitive Machines

NASA, and several tech companies, such as Intuitive Machines [NASDAQ: LUNR] and Japan's ispace have been attempting to land vehicles on the moon - unsuccessfully. However it is apparent that there is investment-justification in establishment of a presence on the lunar surface.

NASA has awarded Intuitive Machines a USD 180.4 million lunar payload contract. [Reuters: 25 Mar 2026]

Spacex: MoonBase Alpha

Elon Musk has discussed the step beyond data centers orbiting Earth is even larger computers in deep space. And furthermore, Musk says the best way to achieve that is to build a city on the moon to manufacture space computers and hurl them into the solar system using a big maglev train. [TechCrunch, Spacex: 12 Feb 2026]


In an X.com post on 8 Feb 2026, Elon Musk explained the focus on the moon as a higher priority than Mars:

⏯️ Moonbase Alpha

...Spacex has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20+ years. The mission of Spacex remains the same: extend consciousness and life as we know it to the stars.

It is only possible to travel to Mars when the planets align every 26 months (six month trip time), whereas we can launch to the moon every 10 days (2 day trip time). This means we can iterate much faster to complete a Moon city than a Mars city.

That said, Spacex will also strive to build a Mars city and begin doing so in about 5 to 7 years, but the overriding priority is securing the future of civilisation and the Moon is faster.

NASA: USD 30 Billion MoonBase

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman announces a shift on NASA's implementation of the National Space Policy and how they are accelerating preparations for America’s return to the surface of the Moon by 2028, and advancing science and discovery. ⏯️ NASA Spacex Moonbase Directive

Jared Isaacman reveals a new NASA Directive. Initiatives include:

  • nuclear power in space,
  • SR1 interplanetary mission before the end of 2028,
  • a fleet of Ingenuity Class copters to explore Mars, and
  • opportunities for fission power providers for propulsion, surface applications.

✅ Spacex Also Ramps Up

⏯️ Elon Musk prioritises Moonbase Alpha [17 Feb 2026]

✅ SpaceX proposes to conduct ⏯️ Starship/Super Heavy launch operations from the ⏯️ Boca Chica Launch Site in Cameron County, Texas. Starship Version 3's successful suborbital flight 13 and successful "Pez Dispenser" deployment of 20 V3 Starlink satellites, re-entry and successful water landing - all in 1 hour!

✅ SpaceX must apply for and obtain an experimental permit(s) and/or a vehicle operator license from the FAA Office of Commercial Space Transportation to operate the ⏯️ Starship/Super Heavy launch vehicle ... ✅ SpaceX is developing a new rocket, ⏯️ Starship/Super Heavy, with the goal of travelling to Mars. FAA 13 Feb 2026

⏯️ ✅ SpaceX Starship vs NASA SLS

Elon Musk plans to build a massive chip manufacturing plant — starting with a smaller advanced technology fabrication plant in Austin — as he looks to put AI data centers in space. It is expected to be capable of 20,000 WSPM (wafer starts per month), or roughly 240,000 wafers per year: [Assessment].

Musk unveiled plans for his “Terafab” on Saturday from the historic Seaholm Power Plant in downtown Austin. This facility would be a joint effort of his companies Tesla, xAI and SpaceX, and it would eventually produce enough chips for 1 trillion watts, or 1 terawatt, of compute each year.

“This is really going to take things to the next level,” Musk said during his presentation livestreamed on X. [Houston Chronicle: 23 Mar 2026]

The space race between US billionaires is heating up, with Elon Musk's SpaceX planning to build a lunar base and Jeff Bezos pushing Blue Origin's ambitions as both companies aim to return humans to the moon ahead of a planned mission by China in 2030. Reuters 13 Feb 2026

Elon Musk has stated that within 2-3 years — potentially by 2028 or 2029 — the cheapest place to run AI will be in space, powered by abundant solar energy and enabled by Starship launches. [FinTech Weekly: 23 Mar 2026]

⏯️ ✅ SpaceX Launches

Communication Issues: Latency

Latency is a crucial consideration when you’re dealing with Moonbase data centers. The distancebetween the Moon and Earth is roughly 384,400 km on average, and even though it sounds like a short distance in space terms, the speed of light—which is how signals travel—means that the round-trip time for data would still introduce a noticeable delay.

Latency from the Moon to Earth

Light Speed: Signals traveling at the speed of light (approximately 299,792 km per second) would experience a one-way latency of about 1.28 seconds.

Round-trip Latency: That means the round-trip time for data (from the Moon to Earth and back) would be around 2.56 seconds. While this isn’t terribly long compared to some deep-space missions, it could still introduce noticeable delays for certain real-time applications.

Impact on Real-Time Applications

For most general applications, a 2.5-second round-trip delay might not be a dealbreaker, but for certain high-speed or time-sensitive processes—like real-time video streaming, interactive gaming, or live communications — this latency could be significant.

  • AI-powered applications that require fast data processing or instant feedback may not be ideal for running directly between the Moon and Earth due to the delay.
  • Cloud gaming or virtual reality applications, where real-time responsiveness is critical, would likely be too slow to provide an optimal experience.
  • Financial transactions or high-frequency trading, which rely on near-instantaneous data exchange, would be impacted by this delay.

How to Address Latency

To make lunar data centers more effective despite latency, there are a few potential solutions:

  • Edge Computing: As we see with edge computing on Earth, placing computational resources closer to the source of the data can reduce latency. For a Moonbase, local edge computing nodes could handle time-sensitive tasks and only transmit essential data back to Earth, reducing reliance on long-distance communication.
  • Data Caching and Preprocessing: Data from lunar-based systems (like a lunar colony or space exploration missions) could be cached and preprocessed locally, with only summary or aggregated data sent back to Earth. This would reduce the need for continuous, high-latency communication.
  • Improved Communication Infrastructure:
    • Laser-based communication: New technologies like laser communication (which NASA has been developing) could significantly increase the data transfer rate and reduce transmission time between the Moon and Earth, although it wouldn't eliminate the basic latency issue.
    • Quantum communication: While still in early stages, quantum communication could someday offer an alternative to traditional communication systems, and even potentially provide faster transmission speeds over long distances. Theoretically, this might reduce latency, but we're still a long way off from practical use for Moon-Earth communication.
    • Satellite Networks: To reduce the Moon-Earth latency, a network of orbital satellites or lunar relay stationscould help facilitate communication between the Moon and Earth. These satellites could act as intermediary relays, potentially shortening the communication path and reducing the impact of latency.
    • Autonomous Systems and AI: For tasks that can tolerate some degree of autonomy, AI and machine learning could help manage operations in space or on the Moon without needing constant Earth-based input. Autonomous data centers could operate with minimal communication, only needing Earth to step in for higher-level decisions or troubleshooting.

Tradeoffs Between Orbital vs. Lunar Data Centers

Compared to orbital data centers, the Moonbase still has the advantage of being physically closer to Earth and potentially benefiting from continuous solar power. But when you weigh that against the latency, it becomes a tradeoff between geographic proximity and communication speed.

Orbital Data Centers: These could have lower latency (since they're closer to Earth), but they may still face challenges related to solar availability and radiation. They also would need to deal with issues like space debris and maintenance.

Moonbase Data Centers: The closer distance to Earth means potentially more reliable communication (though still with latency), but there are environmental challenges like temperature extremes, radiation, and micrometeorites that orbital data centers don’t face. A lunar base could be an ideal location for long-term storage, backup, or special-purpose computing tasks—especially ones that can be run autonomously or involve specialized data from space exploration missions.

Use Cases for a Moonbase Data Center

Given the latency challenge, a Moonbase data center may be better suited for specific use cases rather than general-purpose cloud computing. Potential uses include:

  • Data Storage for Space Missions: Storing the vast amounts of data from lunar exploration, scientific experiments, or deep space missions.
  • AI and Machine Learning Models: Training AI models on space-specific data (like lunar terrain analysis, planetary geology) without having to transmit that data back to Earth all the time.
  • Disaster Recovery: Offering a space-based backup for critical Earth data in case of planetary-scale disasters.
  • Space-Based Applications: Supporting the infrastructure for human colonization of the Moon and Mars, where data needs might differ from Earth-based services.

InterPlanetary Communication and Data Transfer
NASA's Deep Space SCaN Network

With Artemis, NASA will establish a long-term presence at the Moon, opening more of the lunar surface to exploration than ever before. This growth of lunar activity will require new, more robust communications, navigation, and networking capabilities.

NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) program has developed the LunaNet architecture to meet these needs.

LunaNet will leverage innovative networking techniques, standards, and an extensible framework to rapidly expand network capabilities at the Moon. This framework will allow industry, academia, and international partners to build and operate LunaNet nodes alongside NASA. These nodes will offer missions four distinct services: networking, navigation, detection and information, and radio/optical science services. [NASA: 7 Oct 2021]

So, basically, LunaNet interplanetary communication would involve hops from space or between planetary orbital systems (like Starlink) to/from the lunar network and then to/from Earth.

LunaNet could also facilitate communication and edge processing by spacecraft while in transit or in orbit

Meanwhile, Back on Earth

Chips, Terafab

✅ SpaceX and ✅ Tesla will initially invest USD16.8 billion to build Terafab, an advanced AI semiconductor complex in Grimes County, Texas, as the companies race to secure the chip capacity that Elon Musk has called essential to their future. The facility is intended at narrowing the gap between global chip supply and the more than 1 terawatt of computing power that ✅ SpaceX and ✅ Tesla expect to need in the coming years. [Reuters: 7 Aug 2026]

Data Centers

DataCenters.com lists 9,786 data centers in 2,890 cities in 150 countries of which 4,288 are in USA and 270 are in Australia. That requires a lot of electricity - representing potentially related opportunities for investment in power generation.

📰 DCD Data Center News and White Papers

Sydney’s Leading Edge Data Centers, a seven-year-old player backed by NYSE-listed DigitalBridge and Soul Patts, is courting investors after pivoting the business to serve the booming neocloud sector. LEDC, which focuses on regional data centers in NSW, is in the final stages of raising about AUD 80 million to expand its Newcastle operations. [AFR: 11 Aug 2026]

RenewMap provides an update on Australia's data centers as an indicator of future energy demand:

  • renewable energy
  • energy projects
  • transmission projects

AMAZON CORPORATE SERVICES [AFR: 7 May 2026]

✅ Amazon’s data center arm, Amazon Corporate Services Pty Ltd which provides “data hosting services to related parties”, had a standout year, growing annual revenue to $2.2 billion, up 61% from $1.4 billion in 2025.

PROJECT MAVEN [US Department of Defense]

Project Maven is a Defense Department effort for the military to incorporate AI into its systems. One aim was to work with Silicon Valley to build software to swiftly process images such as drone footage for intelligence purposes. When word spread inside ✅ Google about Project Maven, employees protested, saying a company that had once pledged “Don’t be evil” should not help identify targets for drone strikes. Google eventually backed away from the project.

In 2019, ✅ Palantir, a data analytics company co-founded by tech investor Peter Thiel of the Founders Fund, took over Maven.

New defence tech start-ups such as Anduril also emerged, supplying the federal government with AI-backed sensor towers along the southern US border.

🇺🇸 USA Data Centers

Categories of Data Centers

  • Hyperscale Data Centers: Massive facilities built by tech giants (like ✅ Amazon, ✅ Google, ✅ Microsoft, and ✅ Meta) designed to scale infinitely as computational demands grow.
  • Colocation Data Centers: Facilities where a provider rents space, power, and cooling to multiple external organizations or businesses.
  • Enterprise Data Centers: Privately owned and operated facilities built exclusively to house and run a single organization's internal IT operations.

365 Data Centers map

Some of USA's largest data center operators include:

🇺🇸 Top U.S. Data Center Operators

This is an investor's view of investment opportunities in AI technical infrastructure, prepared with data from ClaudeAI and Blackridge [6 Feb 2026]. [Report]

Data Center Mkt Cap Location Sites
365 Data Centers [Not listed] Private Connecticut
✅ Alphabet [NASDAQ:GOOG/L] ~USD 1.9 trillion Google
✅ Amazon [NASDAQ:AMZN] ~USD 1 trillion ⏯️ >900
Broadcom [NASDAQ:AVGO] ~USD 1.59 - USD 1.62 trillion Oracle
Cologix [NASDAQ:COGIX] Colorado 29
Core Scientific [NASDAQ:CORZ] Colorado
CyrusOne [NASDAQ:CONE: KKR and GIP] CAD 92.4bn+3.2m Texas 25
Databank [Not listed] Texas 23
Digital Realty Trust Inc [NYSE:DLR] USD 60.5 bn Texas 115
Equinix Inc [NASDAQ: EQIX] USD 90.8 bn Redwood 200
Flexential [NASDAQ:FLEX] USD 24.3 bn North Carolina 40
IBM [NYSE:IBM] USD 112 bn 11
Iron Mountain [NYSE: IRM] USD 31.3 bn Massachusetts 25
Microsoft [NASDAQ:MSFT] ~USD 2.9 trillion ✅ Microsoft Azure
✅ Nvidia [NASDAQ:NVDA] ~USD 4.0-5.1 trillion Nvidia
Oracle [NYSE:ORCL] ~USD 434 billion Oracle
QTS Technology Centers [Private] Private Kansas 40
Vantage Data Centers Private Colorado 25

Exits:

  • "🇦🇺 Digico Infrastructure [DGT.AX] said on 5 May 2026 that it would sell its Chicago data center for USD 750 million to pay down debt and fund the development of its Sydney site, sending its shares soaring more than 5%. The site was sold to an undisclosed North American fund manager for USD 750 million (about AUD 1.06 billion). DigiCo shares rose as much as 25.4%, marking their strongest intraday gain in more than a year. [Reuters: 5 May 2026]


🔺 ✅ Meta Platforms [NASDAQ:META] data center

✅ NASDAQ:META operates 104 owned and operated data center facilities across 20 U.S. campuses and 4 international regions (Sweden, Ireland, Denmark, Singapore), with a total investment of USD 29.8 billion and a footprint of 53.4 million square feet.

✅ Meta Platforms [✅ NASDAQ:META] share price jumped 5.1% after Reuters reported that Meta plans to shrink its workforce by 20% or more to offset costly AI infrastructure bets and prepare for greater efficiency brought about by AI-assisted workers. [Reuters 13 Mar 2026]

✅ Meta Platforms [✅ NASDAQ:META] is rapidly expanding its global data center infrastructure to support massive AI workloads, transitioning toward gigawatt-plus, super-intelligence facilities. Key 2025-2026 projects include massive sites in Louisiana, Ohio, Indiana, and Texas, utilizing 100% renewable energy. These AI-optimized, sustainable, and locally-supported data centers drive ✅ Meta's Compute division, focusing on large-language models and future AI, with the company spending over $600 billion in the US by 2028.


🔺 ✅ Meta Platforms USD 27 billion Hyperion 2,250-acre, 4-million square foot data center in West Feliciana Parish, Louisiana [Fortune: 26 Mar 2026]


🔺 ⏯️ ✅ Amazon’s New AI Data Center For Anthropic [ANTH.PVT 13 Mar 2026]

🇺🇸 🇬🇧 Softbank Group, SSB Energy Holdings LLC, and OpenAI Partner will build and operate next-generation AI data centers to advance Stargate UK [SoftBank: 8 Jan 2026]. The pause of Stargate UK came as a blow to the UK government's "AI Growth Zones" and its efforts to become a hub for global sovereign AI compute. [Guardian: 9 Apr 2026]

🇬🇧 OpenAI has said it is pausing its Stargate UK AI infrastructure project at Cobalt Park in North Tyneside (near Newcastle) North East England, as it reins in ambitious spending plans ahead of OpenAI's highly anticipated public listing. [Bloomberg 4 Jul 2026]

🇺🇸 From Michigan Avenue, Saline Township looks like any other farming community, with its corn and soybean fields, silos and grain elevators. Just down the road, though, cranes reach above towering fences at the site of a USD 16 billion project — one that has turned this town of 2,400 people into the latest U.S. flashpoint over AI data centers. [Reuters: 16 Jul 2026]

Construction on the Stargate data center, which is expected to stretch over 250 acres, is moving ahead despite resistance from residents concerned about its impact on Saline’s water supply, its power grid and its rural character.

In this deeply polarized country, opposition to data centers is among the few issues that unite voters across ideological lines. Just a third of Americans approve of the pace of data-center construction, according to a June Reuters/Ipsos poll. Only 14% of respondents would support a data center being built in their community. [Reuters: 16 Jul 2026]

Softbank Group and American Electric Power [NASDAQ:AEP] plan a massive 10GW gas powered data center campus on federally owned land in Piketon, Ohio. Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant (PORTS) is a former uranium enrichment facility located in Piketon, Ohio, on a 3,777-acre federal reservation in rural Pike County. [Reuters 20 Mar 2026]


🔺 Softbank and American Electric Power [NASDAQ:AEP] data center at Piketown Ohio


🔺 Austin data center under construction in Texas [Houston Chronicle: 23 Mar 2026]

Issues For Investment Evaluation

Proximity to fiber optic networks: Cities like Ashburn, Silicon Valley, and Dallas are known for their interconnectivity.

Energy supply: Sustainable, renewable energy is becoming a key factor in investment decisions.

Local regulatory environment: Different states have varying regulations on data privacy and energy usage that could impact long-term operational viability.

Future growth plans: Many of the major players are expanding or making significant upgrades to their existing campuses.

Opposition to data centers in Texas: Hill County’s Commissioners Court has voted to put a yearlong moratorium on data center and power plant construction in unincorporated areas, citing an influx of as many as 8 data centers planned there, many of which could have their own power plants. Opposition to data centers is spreading in regions led by both Democrats and Republicans, as politicians try to balance economic development with increasingly vocal landowners who want protections. [Politico: 16 May 2026]

Top Risks for Investors in Data Centers (ChatGPT)

  1. National, State and Municipal taxes [eg Australia's Multinational Anti-Avoidance Law (MAAL) and Diverted Profits Tax (DPT) which caused Google to withhold an AUD 20 billion proposed artificial intelligence and data center hub in March 2026.
  2. Overbuilding & Demand Mismatch
  3. Power Constraints (Critical Bottleneck) - The U.S. technology industry is being pushed to shrink its power use in times of high demand, amid growing public concern that Big Tech's massive electricity needs for its expansion of data centers are maxing out the country's grid. [ Reuters 27 Mar 2026],
  4. Not securing power and water - “Data centers have become super-users of fresh water at a time when globally, demand for fresh water is expected to outstrip supply by 40% by the end of the decade,” a report by NatureFinance: 10 Feb 2025 states. What’s more, 45% of these centers “are located in river basins where water availability is a high risk” [Reuters 17 Dec 2025],
  5. Public (resident, community, government, business) opposition. USD 64 billion of data center projects have been blocked or delayed amid local opposition [Data Center Watch]. Idaho’s Kootenai County imposed an emergency moratorium on new data center permits due to concerns over water and electricity demand. [Data Center Watch].
  6. Government Issues The Australian government is planning new data center rules that will monitor the credentials of company directors and the nationality of investors. The mooted rules will impose stricter security requirements for big data center players such as AirTrunk, CDC Data Centers, ✅ NextDC, and tech giants like ✅ Amazon Web Services, ✅ Google and ✅ Microsoft which host sensitive government information. [AFR: 21 Apr 2026]
  7. ✅ Amazon [NASDAQ:AMZN], ✅ Microsoft [NASDAQ: MSFT] and ✅ Alphabet's Google [NASDAQ:GOOG/L] have each recently abandoned construction of multibillion-dollar data centers over community opposition and now the companies are coming under shareholder pressure over the environmental impact of their projects. [Reuters: 6 Apr 2026]
  8. Underestimating Capex + Obsolescence: ✅ Meta [NASDAQ:META] boosts investment in West Texas AI data center by over sixfold to USD 10 billion [CNBC: 26 Mar 2026]
  9. Rates and Energy Costs
  10. Natural Disasters: eg floods
  11. Customer Concentration: [reliance on a few large clients/tenants]. For example:
    • Hyperscale / wholesale (HIGH concentration)
    • AWS, Microsoft, Google, Oracle
    • Often 1–3 anchor tenants per facility
    • Contracts are massive and long-term
    • Revenue concentration can be extreme
  12. Retail colocation / interconnection (LOW concentration)
    • Hundreds to thousands of customers
    • Mix of enterprises, SaaS, networks, government
    • No single dominant client
  13. Investor caution on fund raising for expansion [✅ NextDC]
  14. Equity capital raise ✅ ✅ NextDC is raising AUD 1.5 billion after increasing this year’s spending on building the digital infrastructure needed to power artificial intelligence by AUD 300 million. ✅ NextDC announced its new equity raising (new shares are being offered at a price of AUD 12.70) and lifted its full-year capital expenditure guidance to AUD 3 billion ... NextDC said it expected to spend a further AUD 5 billion in 2027 to meet surging demand for its services, following a series of new contract wins in the first 3 months of 2026. One of NextDC's planned expansion projects to support new tenant OpenAI is a new 550 MW hyperscale Sydney data center at Eastern Creek (S7), expected to cost AUD 7 billion. [AFR: 20 Apr 2026]

Component Suppliers

TIER 1 - Mission Critical (Highest AI Value):

  • 1. Broadcom [[NASDAQ:AVGO] - The Custom Silicon King
  • 2. Marvell [ NASDAQ:MRVL] - The Connectivity Backbone
    • Q3 FY2026 revenue: USD 2.075B, up 37% YoY
    • AI revenue exceeded USD1.5B in FY2025, projected to surpass $2.5B in FY2026
    • Data center segment now represents 75% of revenue
    • Powers ✅ Amazon AWS Trainium/ Inferentia chips
    • Marvel[NASDAQ:MRVL] acquisition adds photonic fabric technology with USD 1B run-rate target by 2028
    • Strategic value: Critical for optical interconnects (800G to 1.6T transition)
  • 3. Arista Networks (ARISTA [NYSE:ANET]) - The AI Networking Leader
    • Q3 2025 revenue: USD 2.31B, up 27.5% YoY
    • FY2026 guidance: USD 10.65B revenue with $2.75B
    • EtherLink architecture dominates 2/3 of AI cluster sales
    • Partnered with ✅ NVIDIA, AMD, OpenAI
    • Strategic value: Backend networking for AI training clusters is non-negotiable

TIER 2 - Highly Important

  • 4. Applied Materials ([NYSE:ANET]) - The Equipment Enabler
    • FY2025 revenue: USD 28.37B, up 4% YoY
    • Preparing for higher demand in H2 2026
    • 30% higher revenue opportunity per fab with Gate-All-Around GAA and backside power delivery
    • Strategic value: Enables all advanced chip manufacturing (foundational, not AI-specific)
  • 5. EverPure / Pure Storage (NYSE: PSTG) - The AI Storage Specialist
  • 6. Analog Devices (ADI) - Signal Integrity & Power
    • (Need to add: power management for AI chips)

TIER 3 - Supporting Infrastructure

  • 7. NetApp (NTAP) - Enterprise AI Storage
    • FY2025 revenue: USD 6.57B, up 4.85% YoY
    • 150 AI infrastructure deals closed in Q4
    • All-flash array revenue: USD 4.1B annualized run-rate, up 14%
    • Strategic value: Enterprise AI adoption, but less critical than hyperscaler-focused
  • 8. Seagate (STX) / Western Digital (WDC) - Mass Storage
    • Strategic value: Least AI-specific; training uses NVMe/SSD", HDDs mainly for archival
    • AI workloads favor flash over spinning disks
  • 9. Rambus (RMBS) - Memory Interfaces

More Critical Players

Vertiv (VRT) - Liquid cooling & power infrastructure for AI datacenters

Eaton (ETN) - Power distribution critical as clusters scale

Coherent (COHR) - Optical transceivers (competes with Marvell)

ASML

ASML plans to determine whether it can expand the maximum size of chips it can print beyond its current boundary - roughly the size of a postage stamp - which limits its speed [Reuters: 2 Mar 2026].

ASML - ⏯️ EUV extreme ultra violet photo lithography monopoly (enables everything, though not US-listed):


🔺 Intel's $400 million EUV Lithographic Chip Production Machine

Strongly Consider

✅ Nvidia - the elephant in the room for GPUs has kicked off the next generation of AI With Rubin 6 new chips, one incredible AI supercomputer. Rubin is in full production, and Rubin-based products will be available from partners in the second half of 2026. The Rubin platform uses extreme codesign across the 6 chips — the ✅ Nvidia Vera CPU, ✅ Nvidia Rubin GPU, ✅ Nvidia 6 Switch, ✅ Nvidia ConnectX®-9 SuperNIC, ✅ Nvidia BlueField®-4 DPU and ✅ Nvidia Spectrum™-6 Ethernet Switch — to slash training time and inference token costs. [✅ Nvidia press release: 5 Jan 2026]

Amkor Technology [AMKR:NASDAQ] has announced a multi-year strategic partnership with ✅ Nvidia to develop advanced semiconductor packaging and test technologies for next-generation AI and accelerated computing platforms. Under the agreement, ✅ Nvidia will provide a prepayment to support the expansion of Amkor’s U.S. advanced packaging capacity. Advanced packaging enables the performance, energy efficiency and system-level integration required for AI infrastructure. ✅ Nvidia and Amkor will align their long-term roadmaps to advance technologies including high-density interconnects and next-generation heterogeneous integration. ✅ Nvidia worth USD 1.5 billion to expand advanced semiconductor packaging and test capacity in USA, as the chip industry races to build out AI infrastructure. [Amkor: 23 Jul 2026]

AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) and Anthropic have announced a strategic partnership to deploy up to 2 gigawatts of AMD Instinct™ MI450 Series GPUs in AMD Helios™ rackscale solutions, with deployment of the first gigawatt beginning in the first half of 2027.

The extraordinary pace of AI adoption is driving rapid growth in demand for training and inference capacity. Anthropic is scaling its compute infrastructure to serve strong and growing demand for Claude, and its adoption of AMD Helios™ at gigawatt scale represents a major expansion of AMD’s position at the center of the global AI infrastructure buildout.

Anthropic will deploy AMD Helios™ rackscale solutions featuring AMD Instinct™ MI455X GPUs, part of the AMD Instinct MI450 Series, together with AMD EPYC™ “Venice” CPUs, AMD Pensando™ networking and AMD ROCm™ software. Purpose-built for next-generation AI training and inference, AMD Helios™ delivers the performance, efficiency and scale required for the most demanding AI workloads. This deployment builds on Anthropic’s existing use of AMD Instinct™ MI355X GPUs.

In addition, AMD and Anthropic are launching a multiyear engineering collaboration to use Claude to accelerate AMD software development. Specifically, the teams will use Claude to optimize workloads for AMD Instinct GPUs and accelerate ROCm software development. AMD will also broadly adopt Claude across its engineering and product development teams.

AMD has committed to make a strategic equity investment of up to USD 5 billion in Anthropic in the future. [AMD: 22 Jul 2026]

AMD) - MI300X competing with ✅ Nvidia.

Super Micro (SMCI) - AI server integration

Dell/HPE - AI infrastructure deployment

And also:

🇺🇸 Oracle and OpenAI Stargate AI Data Center in Texas

Stargate AI Data Center in Abilene, Texas is the first and flagship site of a USD 500 billion national AI infrastructure initiative announced in Jan 2025. Located on a 1,000–1,100 acre tract known as the Lancium Clean Campus (also called the Crusoe Abilene Campus), the facility is under construction and nearing completion.

🔺 Stargate AI Data Center in Abilene Texas

Objectives: Stargate will secure American leadership in AI, create hundreds of thousands of American jobs, and generate massive economic benefit for the entire world. This project will not only support the re-industrialization of the United States but also provide a strategic capability to protect the national security of America and its allies.

Capacity: The facility is designed to deliver 1.2 gigawatts (1.2 GW) of power at full scale, with 200 MW already deployed as of early 2025. It is powered by a combination of renewable energy and on-site natural gas generation, utilizing Lancium’s Smart Response™ technology for grid optimization and decarbonization.

Key Partners The data center is being developed by Crusoe Energy Systems LLC and operated in partnership with OpenAI and Oracle. The site is a cornerstone of the Stargate project. The initial equity funders in Stargate are:

  • SoftBank Group Corp: core financier,
  • SB Energy (Softbank subsidiary): contracted to provide solar and battery solutions to power the Abilene facilities,
  • OpenAI,
  • Oracle, and
  • MGX.

SoftBank and OpenAI are the lead partners for Stargate, with SoftBank having financial responsibility and OpenAI having operational responsibility.

As part of Stargate, Oracle, ✅ Nvidia, and OpenAI will closely collaborate to build and operate this computing system. This builds on a deep collaboration between OpenAI and ✅ Nvidia going back to 2016 and a newer partnership between OpenAI and Oracle.

This project also builds on the existing OpenAI partnership with ✅ Microsoft. OpenAI will continue to increase its consumption of Azure as OpenAI continues its work with ✅ Microsoft with this additional compute to train leading models and deliver great products and services.

Lancium report on provision of clean energy for the Abilene facility. [Lancium: 18 Mar 2025] Lancium has secured USD 600 million debt financing for 1.2GW clean energy development for the Abilene project [Lancium: 18 Oct 2025]

Masayoshi Son, SoftBank's CEO will be the chairman.

Oracle has committed to developing 4.5 gigawatts of data center capacity for OpenAI, with this Abilene site being a major component. OpenAI signed a deal to purchase USD 300 billion in computing power30 b from Oracle over 5 years, starting in 2027 [WSJ 10 Sep 2025].

Economic Impact: The project has created approximately 6,000 construction jobs and is projected to generate $4 billion in economic impact over the next two decades. It has boosted local spending, tax revenues, and spurred infrastructure development, including a new 1,000-unit housing project.

Expansion Plans: OpenAI and Oracle have abandoned plans to expand the facility from 1.2 GW to 2 GW due to financing challenges and shifting demand forecasts. However, ✅ Meta Platforms is evaluating a lease for the additional capacity, with Nvidia facilitating discussions and having paid a USD 150 million deposit to Crusoe to secure its interest.

Challenges: The project has caused traffic disruptions, environmental concerns, and a housing crisis in Abilene due to the sudden influx of workers. Some data center buildings experienced outages in early 2026 due to winter weather affecting liquid cooling systems, though both Crusoe and Oracle report strong ongoing collaboration.

The Abilene Stargate site is a pivotal hub in the global AI infrastructure race, combining massive scale, renewable energy integration, and complex logistics, even as expansion plans have been paused. [Lancium: 18 Mar 2025]

⁉️ Some doubt about Stargate

Project Financing Problems: Some partners are reconsidering their commitment to Stargate. Oracle and OpenAI have abandoned plans to expand the Stargate AI data center after negotiations dragged over financing and OpenAI's changing needs. [Bloomberg: 7 Mar 2026]

The collapsed talks created an opening for ✅ Meta Platforms to step in and consider leasing the planned expansion site in Abilene, Texas, from developer Crusoe, with ✅ Nvidia helping facilitate Meta’s discussions.

✅ Nvidia paid a USD 150 million deposit to Crusoe and began helping court ✅ Meta Platforms as a tenant for the expansion, to ensure its products would still fill the expanded data center rather than that of rival Advanced Micro Devices Inc.

Status as at 30 Sep 2025: The site is operational with 10 buildings under construction, and two buildings are already up and running. The campus is expected to be fully completed by the end of 2026.

Status as at Mar 2026: Oracle and OpenAI have abandoned plans to expand their 1.2 GW AI data center in the Stargate project, from 1.2 GW to 2 GW due to financing negotiations and shifting infrastructure needs. The initial 1.2 GW site remains active as part of the Stargate AI project, with ✅ Meta Platforms now considering taking over the expanded capacity.

Status as at Mar 2026:

Wall Street Millenial [W M] is now referring to OpenAI's USD110 billion funding round as mostly fake, and refers to Stargate as a hoax. W💲M alleges that Sam Altman is not an AI expert, and has no formal education in AI. ⏯️ W💲M discusses OpenAI's funding situation. ColdFusion reports that OpenAI may start incorporating advertisements in its responses.

Crusoe has officially confirmed that ✅ Microsoft has signed on to take the remaining capacity at its Abilene, Texas, campus. ✅ Microsoft has signed an agreement for 900MW of capacity, including two new buildings and an on-site power plant. Each of the two new buildings will offer 336MW of IT capacity. The lease will bring the total projected capacity at the site to 2.1GW. [DCD: 27 Mar 2027]

✅ Microsoft's data centers will sit on land adjacent to the existing Abilene campus, being used by OpenAI and Oracle. Land works are already underway, and the first building is expected to be energized in mid-2027.

✅ Amazon's Northern Indiana Data Center for Anthropic [ANTH.PVT]

🔺 ✅ Amazon's 1,200 acre Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] 2.2GW data center in Northern Indiana will support 500,000 ✅ AWS Trainium 2 and ✅ AWS Trainium 3 chips. This number will increase to 1 million chips by the end of 2025.

Power for the data center will be provided by Northern Indiana Public Service Co (NIPSCO). To support the energy requirements of that data center, NIPSCO Generation will build about 3 gigawatts of new generation capacity, including new gas-fired power plants and battery storage systems. [ChatGPT]

The initial cost of the Rainer data center campus and related facilities is estimated to be around USD 26 billion:

  • USD 11 billion for the initial buildout, and
  • USD 15 billion for expanded data center campuses.

https://techinvestment.com/images/gen/aws_indiana.png

🇺🇸 ✅ Amazon's Northern Louisiana Data Centers

🇺🇸 ✅ Amazon plans to spend USD 12 billion on AI data centers in the Caddo and Bossier Parishes of Northern Louisiana. [CNBC 23 Feb 2026]

✅ Meta Platforms [NASDAQ:META] Hut-8 Louisiana Data Center

🇦🇺 Australian Data Centers

[AFR Updates: Here]

Hosting Certification Framework

The Australian Government's Hosting Certification Framework will monitor the credentials of company directors and the nationality of investors. AFR reports the rules will impose stricter security requirements for big data center players such as AirTrunk, CDC Data Centers and ✅ NextDC, and tech giants like ✅ Amazon AWS, ✅ Google and Microsoft, which host sensitive government information.[AFR: 21 Apr 2026]

The machinery-of-government change involves the functional transfer of:

⚡️ Energy

[Oxford Economics Australia, "Data Center Energy Demand Final Report", July 2025]

The AFR reports [24 May 2026] that data center demand for electricity may limit its ability to support data center growth in Victoria. It suggests the State may need to revert to gas-fired power to meet growth-driven demand.

Source 2015 2015 2020 2025
Brown Coal (TWh) 51.1 TWh (92%) 46.2 TWh (66%) 34.4 TWh (68%) 22-25 TWh (45%)

"In FY25, Australian data centers are estimated to have consumed 3.9TWh of electricity. The National Energy Market (NEM) made up 98% of this and represented approximately 2% of NEM grid-supplied consumption. Under the Step Change scenario, data center consumption in Australia is forecast to grow at an average annual rate of 25.1% to reach 12.0 TWh by FY30 and 34.5 TWh by FY50. This trajectory underscores the increasing importance of data centers as a structurally significant electricity load within Australia’s energy system. Of the 34.5 TWh, 33.8 TWh of this is forecast to be on the NEM, representing 12% of NEM grid-supplied consumption by FY50."


Data centers in NSW

✅ Microsoft will invest AUD 25 billion over the next 3 years in data centers in Australia

The $25 billion spend trumps an earlier commitment by Microsoft’s rival, ✅ Amazon Web Services (AWS), to spend AUD 20 billion on local data centers in the same period.

✅ Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella was in Sydney on 23 Apr 2026 to announce the investment. Nadella said he knew big technology companies had to convince the public that they had a “social licence” to build AI infrastructure amid concerns that data centers consumed too much power and water, and many workers feared that AI would take their jobs. [AFR: 23 Apr 2026]

✅ Amazon Web Services Data Centers in Australia

✅ AWS has a significant infrastructure presence in Australia with multiple data centers and facilities [AWS 23 Apr 2026]:

  • AWS Regions:
    • Sydney Region (Asia Pacific): Launched in 2012, this was AWS's first region in Australia, providing enterprises, public sector organizations, startups, and SMBs access to cloud infrastructure.
    • Melbourne Region: AWS's second region in Australia, giving customers additional architectural options including the ability to store backup data in geographically separated locations within the country.
  • AWS Local Zones:
    • Perth: Launched in 2023 as the first AWS Local Zones location in Australia, placing AWS compute, storage, database, and other services near population and IT centers for single-digit millisecond latency.
  • Edge Locations:
    • Seven

🇺🇸 🇦🇺 🇸🇬 AirTrunk

AirTrunk Operating Pty Ltd operates as a technology company. The company offers a platform for cloud, content, and large enterprise customers. AirTrunk Operating serves clients in Australia and Asia.

Updates

19 Jul 2026: Next Capital’s AUD375 million fifth fund has agreed to acquire Tokyo-listed Fujitsu’s 5 Australian data centers. Next Capital is said to have paid just under the portfolio’s AUD200 million replacement value. Next Capital will take ownership of Fujitsu’s up-and-running data centers in NSW’s Homebush and Greystanes, Queensland’s Eight Mile Plains, Victoria’s Noble Park and Western Australia’s Malaga. The deal does not include the North Ryde asset or underlying land. [AFR: 19 Jul 2026]. Goldman Sachs Group acquired NextCapital Group in Aug 2022 [Goldman Sachs: 29 Aug 2022]. NextCapital’s platform will become part of Goldman Sachs Asset Management’s Multi-Asset Solutions (MAS) business.

30 Apr 2026: AirTrunk will invest AUD 4.2 billion to build 2 giant data centers in Malaysia, as its existing campuses in the country near capacity amid booming demand for facilities that can power artificial intelligence. [AFR: 30 Apr 2026]

7 Apr 2026: AirTrunk is seeking to list a portfolio of up-and-running data centers in a property trust, rather than the underlying AirTrunk business. Bloomberg reported it had tapped three investment banks to oversee the mooted USD 1.5 billion (AUD 2.2 billion) Singaporean REIT IPO later in 2026. [AFR: 7 Apr 2026]

🇺🇸 Anthropic [ANTH.PVT]

Updates

31 Mar 2026: Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] Would Like to Open an Office in Australia

Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] CEO Dario Amodei has been meeting with Australian policymakers as a deal for using local data center capacity to run some of its AI models is expected. Alongside political meetings, the boss of the USD 380 billion (AUD 555 billion) AI company is meeting executives from Australian data center firms, including ✅ NextDC [NXT.AX], AirTrunk and CDC Data Centers.

Anthropic's [ANTH.PVT] initial focus will be supporting its enterprise, startup, and research customers. Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] already works with some of Australia and New Zealand's most innovative organizations—from enterprises like Canva, Quantium, and Commonwealth Bank of Australia [CBA:AX], to startups pioneering new AI applications across diverse fields such as agtech, physical AI, climate tech and more.

Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] has committed to paying for new power generation and upgrading local energy grids if it builds data centers in Australia, after announcing it will open a Sydney office later this year. Evan Frondorf, Anthropic's [ANTH.PVT] head of external partnerships and policy, told a Senate committee the company would take the same approach to its global data center rollout. [AFR: 12 Mar 2026]

Australia and New Zealand rank 4th and 8th globally in Claude.ai usage, relative to population, according to the latest Economic Index. Both countries show strong use of Claude for computer and coding tasks, along with educational instruction and research, and Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] has already begun building out a local team and partnerships aligned with these trends.

🇦🇺 Anthropic's [ANTH.PVT] report on Australia suggests that its usage is the 4th highest of 166 countries. Report: 15 Jan 2026 Update: 10 Mar 2026

🌏 Claude says Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] has offices in San Francisco, Seattle, New York, and Washington D.C. Anthropic's European footprint includes offices in London, Dublin, Zurich, Paris, and Munich. In Asia-Pacific Anthropic has offices Tokyo, Bengaluru (India), and Seoul.

Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] is planning to open an office in Sydney. A major problem is the uncertainty of tax liability if the Australian Taxation Office [ATO] decides that Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] is subject to resident tax under the Multinational Anti-Avoidance Law (MAAL). The MAAL counters the erosion of the Australian tax base by multinationals using artificial and contrived arrangements to avoid the attribution of profits to a permanent establishment in Australia.

Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] has announced a USD 50 billion investment to develop, own, and operate its own data centers in the United States, starting in Texas and New York, in partnership with UK-based Fluidstack. Anthropic's [ANTH.PVT] approach is a hybrid model: relying on massive, existing infrastructure from ✅ AWS and ✅ Google (1M+ chips), while simultaneously building a USD 50 billion custom-operated, AI-optimized data center footprint via Fluidstack to ensure long-term, independent scaling. [Anthropic [ANTH.PVT] clients include Poolside, ✅ Nvidia [NVDA:NASDAQ], ✅ Meta Platforms, Cognition [CGTX:NASDAQ] and Black Forest Labs [a href= https://www.fluidstack.io/gpu-clusters target="x">]

Dario Amodei met with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Industry Minister Tim Ayres in Canberra on Wednesday morning to sign a memorandum of understanding between Anthropic and the government. Anthropic has announced it is committed to paying for new power generation and upgrading local energy grids if it builds data centers in Australia. [AFR: 22 Mar 2026]

CDC

Canberra-based data center giant CDC is privately owned by Infratil Limited [ASX:IFT] and the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation. [AFR: 31 Mar 2026].

CDC has signed a 555-megawatt contract with an unnamed US hyperscaler, after 6 months of what Founder and CEO Greg Boorer describes as day-and-night negotiations. This is the biggest data center contract in Australian history. [AFR 6 May 2026].

Firmus

Firmus announced it has received full commitments for a USD 2 billion strategic equity investment round. The round includes follow-on participation from Coatue and ✅ Nvidia, alongside new investment from funds managed by Blackstone Tactical Opportunities and other Blackstone vehicles (“Blackstone”), with additional participation from global trading and technology firm Jane Street. The investment will accelerate the next phase of Firmus’ Project Southgate AI Factory rollout across Australia while also laying the groundwork for expansion into other key Asia-Pacific markets. [Firmus: 7 Aug 2026]

Firmus, which is backed ✅ Nvidia, plans to build a 1000 megawatt factory in Tailem Bend, a regional town east of Adelaide, and has also proposed a 1300MW factory in Stirling North, a small town near Port Augusta. [AFR: 8 Jul 2026]

Firmus has called an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) for 31 Jul 2026, asking existing shareholders to vote on its biggest equity raising to date. Preference shares were offered at AUD 230, giving the company an equity value of AUD 15.5 billion on a post-money basis. The offer was not marketed externally and has been taken up Firmus’ existing shareholders. The only thing outstanding is the EGM approval. [AFR: 8 Jul 2026]

Firmus wants to fast-track billions of dollars of data center projects in South Australia with state government support, as its expansion plans in Tasmania hit local community resistance and council delays.

Firmus plans to float on the ASX touting an AUD15.5 billion valuation later in 2026.

Firmus plans to build a 1000 megawatt factory in Tailem Bend, a regional town east of Adelaide, and has also proposed a 1300MW factory in Stirling North, a small town near Port Augusta.[">AFR: 21 Aug 2026]

Firmus has datacenters in Southgate and Singapore. Firmus is in the process of a USD 5.5 billion (AUD 7.7 billion) IPO on the ASX, with reports indicating a planned listing in July 2026. Firmus is expected to be valued at nearly AUD 7 billion after ✅ Nvidia doubled its investment. [AFR: 29 Apr 2026]

Firmus is also planning to build data centers in Tasmania, Victoria, NSW, Western Australia and the ACT. In Tasmania, its initial facility is in Launceston, while a second near George Town is being reviewed by the local council. [AFR: 6 Jul 2026] [ target="x">">AFR: 23 Jul 2026]

Firmus has announced a landmark 12-year wholesale energy supply agreement with Gunvor Group for 600 MW of firm electricity to support the next phase of Project Southgate, its strategy to develop large-scale AI factory campuses across regional Australia. Under the agreement, Gunvor Group will support the development of 1.2 GW of new renewable generation and 1.5 GWh of new battery storage by 2032 to supply Firmus' planned South Australian expansion. [Firmus]

Firmus, which is planning a $15.5 billion Australian sharemarket listing, is a step closer to building a new data centre on Tasmania’s north coast after council planners suggested it proceed despite community objections. The proposal to build a 288-megawatt data centre at Bell Bay, north of Launceston, will be voted on by George Town Council on 25 Aug 2026 amid strong community concern over the project’s water and energy usage, as well as light and noise pollution. [AFR: 21 Aug 2026]

Fluidstack

Fluidstack is rapidly scaling its capacity to serve major clients like ✅ Meta Platforms and various AI startups.

🇺🇸 Iren Ltd

Iren has announced a multi-billion-dollar partnership with ✅ Nvidiain which ✅ Nvidia would spend USD 3.4 billion (AUD 4.7 billion) to use and expand IREN's data centers, which will be filled with thousands of ✅ Nvidia’s Blackwell chips. [AFR 8 May 2026]

Iren intends to dedicate its existing and future data centers in North America, Australia and Europe solely to cloud services that power AI. Iren has also ramped up its revenue projections and now expects to make USD 4 billion from selling AI cloud services in 2027, up from the USD 3.7 billion forecast in May 2026. The new target assumes Iren will have 480MW of capacity by the end of calendar 2026, up from just 3MW a year ago. The target doesn’t include other revenue that Iren expects to make from an additional 730MW of capacity planned to be deployed by the end of 2027. Iren's biggest customer is ✅ Microsoft. In the half year to 24 Jul 2026 IREN stock fell 29% to USD 37.07.

🇦🇺 Macquarie Data Centers

Macquarie Data Centers has data centers in Sydney and Canberra

🇦🇺 Modular Data Centers

Oracle has agreed a 6-year contract worth AUD 2.3 billion with Datapod, a Canberra-based modular data center manufacturer. Datapod primarily supplies to the Australian government and military intelligence services, and has been in discussions with Oracle about a potential deal for more than 2 years. [AFR: 27 Apr 2025]

The DataPod System provides customers with advanced performance, flexibility, and deployability specific to the new supercomputer needs. The combination of less cost and speed to deployment means organisations can begin to think in real time as opposed to the lengthy plan/design/build delays familiar to legacy data center projects. The modular approach means a high performance computing solution can practically be purchased off the shelf and significantly reduces the time associated with planning and implementation. [DataPod">DataPod]

🇦🇺 Portable Data Centers

Several Australian companies are launching portable, containerised data centers. These include:


🔺 Armada Edge Platform (AEP) portable data center convoy.

WinDC aims to place data center infrastructure at power generation sites and will deploy 11MW of modular data centers designed and built by Armada and its partners across renewable energy sites in New South Wales and other locations in the Australian Energy Market Operator's (AEMO) systems, as well as in Western Australia. Armada Edge units are currently built in the United States and Europe. DCD 16 Mar 2026

Sidebar: ⏯️ About chip production [ASML] by Veritasium

✅ SharonAI

✅ SharonAI Holdings Inc [SHAZ:NASDAQ]is a neocloud provider with offices in North Sydney and New York. It doesn’t own or operate data centers - it has a 6-year deal for access to ✅ Nvidia chips housed in data centers. SharonAI is planning to set up an ✅ Nvidia-powered data center in Australia, funded by an AUD 1.6 billion capital raise.

✅ SharonAI rents access to ✅ Nvidia equipment inside data centres. It said it had USD 8.8 billion (AUD 12.5 billion) in contracts – including a USD 4.9 billion 6-year deal with ✅ Nvidia – and a 60% increase in capacity. [AFR: 7 Aug 2026]

Component Suppliers

TIER 1 - Mission Critical (Highest AI Value):

  • 1. Broadcom [NASDAQ:AVGO] - The Custom Silicon King
    • Q4 FY2025 AI revenue: $6.5B, up 74%
    • $73B AI backlog over next 18 months
    • FY2026 AI revenue projected at $40.4B
    • Dominates custom AI chips (✅ Google TPUs, ✅ Meta, OpenAI partnerships)
    • 70% market share in custom AI Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs)
    • Strategic value: Irreplaceable for hyperscalers wanting alternatives to ✅ Nvidia
  • 2. Marvell [NASDAQ:MRVL] - The Connectivity Backbone
    • Q3 FY2026 revenue: $2.075B, up 37% YoY
    • AI revenue exceeded $1.5B in FY2025, projected to surpass $2.5B in FY2026
    • Data center segment now represents 75% of revenue
    • Powers ✅ Amazon AWS Trainium/Inferentia chips
    • Celestial AI acquisition adds photonic fabric technology with $1B run-rate target by 2028
    • Strategic value: Critical for optical interconnects (800G to 1.6T transition)
  • 3. Arista Networks ( [NYSE:ANET]) - The AI Networking Leader
    • Q3 2025 revenue: $2.31B, up 27.5% YoY
    • FY2026 guidance: $10.65B revenue with $2.75B
    • EtherLink architecture dominates 2/3 of AI cluster sales
    • Partnered with ✅ NVIDIA, AMD, OpenAI
    • Strategic value: Backend networking for AI training clusters is non-negotiable

TIER 2 - Highly Important:

TIER 3 - Supporting Infrastructure:

  • 7. NetApp (NTAP) - Enterprise AI Storage
    • FY2025 revenue: $6.57B, up 4.85% YoY
    • 150 AI infrastructure deals closed in Q4
    • All-flash array revenue: $4.1B annualized run-rate, up 14%
    • Strategic value: Enterprise AI adoption, but less critical than hyperscaler-focused
  • 8. Seagate [NASDAQ:STX] / Western Digital [NASDAQ:WDC] - Mass Storage
    • Strategic value: Least AI-specific; training uses NVMe/SSD, HDDs mainly for archival
    • AI workloads favor flash over spinning disks
  • 9. Rambus [NASDAQ:RMBS] - Memory Interfaces
    Strategic value: Enabling technology but smaller TAM, niche player in chiplets

More Critical Players

Must Have

Vertiv [NASDAQ:VRT] - Liquid cooling & power infrastructure for AI datacenters

Eaton [NASDAQ:ETN] - Power distribution critical as clusters scale

Coherent [NASDAQ:COHR] - Optical transceivers (competes with Marvell)

ASML [NASDAQ:ASML] - EUV extreme ultra violet photo lithography monopoly (enables everything, though not US-listed):

  • ASML plans to determine whether it can expand the maximum size of chips it can print beyond its current boundary - roughly the size of a postage stamp - which limits its speed [Reuters: 2 Mar 2026].

Strongly Consider

✅ Nvidia [NASDAQ:NVDA] - The elephant in the room for GPUs. [Nvidia [NASDAQ:NVDA]] has kicked off the next generation of AI With Google [NASDAQ:GOOG/L]: 6 new chips, one incredible AI supercomputer. Rubin is in full production, and Rubin-based products will be available from partners in the second half of 2026. The Rubin platform uses extreme codesign across the 6 chips — the Nvidia Vera CPU, Nvidia [NASDAQ:NVDA] Rubin GPU, Nvidia [NASDAQ:NVDA] NVLink™ 6 Switch, Nvidia ConnectX®-9 SuperNIC, Nvidia [NASDAQ:NVDA] BlueField®-4 DPU and Nvidia [NASDAQ:NVDA] Spectrum™-6 Ethernet Switch — to slash training time and inference token costs. [Nvidia press release: 5 Jan 2026]

Advanced Micro Devices [NASDAQ:AMD] - MI300X competing with ✅ Nvidia [NASDAQ:NVDA]

Super Micro (SMCI) - AI server integration

Dell/HPE - AI infrastructure deployment

And also:

✅ We are investors in these companies

Amazon's AWS Australian Data Centers

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese joined ✅ Amazon Web Services (AWS) CEO Matt Garman in Seattle today to welcome AWS’s investment of AUD$20 billion into data center infrastructure in Australia.

Over the next 5 years, this landmark investment will provide the world’s most advanced infrastructure that can support complex artificial intelligence (AI) and all other technology applications, enabling organisations across Australia to train and deploy AI models and continue to rapidly innovate. [Prime Minister Australia: 14 Jun 2025]

AWS data centers in Australia include:

  • NSW - Sydney: 12:
    • AWS Asia Pacific Region
    • AWS Direct Connect: 2
    • AWS CloudFront Edge
    • Regional Edge Cache
    • Equinix SY3 and Global Switch
  • Victoria:
  • AWS Asia Pacific Region
  • AWS Direct Connect Melbourne
  • Amazon CloudFront Edge
  • Data center facilities: Equinix ME2 and NEXTDC M1
  • Australian Capital Territory (ACT)
    • AWS Direct Connect location in Canberra
    • Data center facility: NEXTDC C1 in Canberra
  • Western Australia
    • AWS Local Zones location in Perth
    • AWS Direct Connect in Perth
    • Data center facility: NEXTDC P1 in Perth
  • Other States
    • Renewable energy projects in Queensland, NSW, and Victoria supporting AWS operations
    • 7 CloudFront edge locations and 1 Regional Edge Cache locations

    • 🇺🇸 UAE Data Centers Targeted in Middle East Conflict

    ✅ AWS said two UAE facilities were hit directly, while in Bahrain, a drone strike in close proximity to one of its facilities caused physical impact damage to its infrastructure. AWS said the drones caused structural damage, disrupted power delivery to infrastructure, and in some cases, required fire suppression activities that resulted in additional water damage.

    ✅ AWS added that it is working quickly to restore services to the affected areas, but that it could take time given the nature of the physical damage involved.

    ✅ AWS recommended that customers who use its services in the region back up their data and potentially migrate workloads to alternative AWS facilities in the rest of the world.

    ✅ AWS also warned that the ongoing conflict means the broader operating environment in the Middle East remains unpredictable. [BBC: 1 Mar 2026]

    ⏯️ Tour an ✅ AWS Data Center

    🇦🇺 Australian Data Centers

    Australia has 270 data centers, some of which are targetable as investments. The ASX lists 100 of those data centers, 13 of which are large cap companies.

    Data Center's latest update reports that Australia has 270 data centers [14 Mar 2026]

    Location Number
    Adelaide 18
    Albury 2
    Ballarat 3
    Bendigo 1
    Brisbane 24
    Canberra 18
    Christmas Island 1
    Coffs Harbour 1
    Darwin 6
    Dubbo 1
    Geraldton 2
    Gold Coast 1
    Grafton 1
    Hobart 5
    Launceston 1
    Melbourne 51
    Morwell 1
    Moss Vale 1
    Newcastle AU 5
    Newman 1
    Perth 26
    Port Hedland 1
    Sunshine Coast 2
    Sydney 91
    Tamworth 1
    Toowoomba 1
    Townsville 2
    Wagga Wagga 1
    Wollongong 1
    Total Data Centers 270

    ✅ NextDC Limited [ASX:NXT] has 22 data centers in Australia and others in New Zealand, Japan and Malaysia. It is planning to invest a further AUD 2.7 billion in data centers in 2026 to meet AI demand [AFR 25 Feb 2026]:


    NextDC Fund Raising 2026

    ✅ NextDC has raised AUD 750 million from the bond market, expanding its war chest to AUD 6.6 billion following a fundraising drive to finance its planned digital infrastructure build-out. In the past three weeks, NextDC and its bankers at Barrenjoey have also raised AUD 1.7 billion through a 100-year bond anchored by Canadian pension investment giant La Caisse, and have launched a AUD 1.5 billion equity raising.

    Including the new 4-year subordinated bond offer, NextDC has AUD 6.6 billion in cash and undrawn debt facilities, up from AUD 4.2 billion at 31 Dec 2026.[AFR: 24 Apr 2026]

    NextDC reported its financial results for Q1/2026 on 25 Feb 2026. This report mentions a proposed partnership with third-party capital through a JVCo structure for data centers S4 and S7 through a 4-year and 7-year $500 million subordinated bond issue.

    NextDC held a series of calls and meetings with credit investors across Australia ahead of its proposed 4-year and 7-year AUD 500 million subordinated bond issue. However, without an independent assessment of the proposal this program has been abandoned. [AFR 15 Mar 2026]

    🇦🇺 Australia's Largest Data Center Operators

    Location Data Center Owner Capacity
    Melbourne AirTrunk MEL1 AirTrunk ~276 MW
    Sydney AirTrunk SYD2 AirTrunk ~158 MW
    Sydney AirTrunk SYD1 AirTrunk ~121 MW
    Melbourne (West Footscray) NEXTDC M3 ✅ NextDC ~150 MW
    Sydney (Artarmon) NEXTDC S3 ✅ NextDC ~80 MW
    Sydney (Eastern Creek) EC1-EC4 CDC/Infratil ~100 MW+
    Sydney (Alexandria) Equinix SY5 Equinix large multi-hall colocation (~9,000 cabinets)
    Sydney East/West Global Switch Global Switch ~70 MW+
    Melbourne (Tullamarine) NEXTDC M2 ✅ NEXTDC ~40 MW+
    Melbourne (Brooklyn) CDC BK1 CDC ~780 MW+

    UPDATES

    Google, Amazon, Microsoft Investments in Australia


    ✅ Google, ✅ Amazon and ✅ Microsoft are investing billions of dollars in digital infrastructure in Australia, largely by leasing space from local data center operators AirTrunk, ✅ NextDC and CDC Data Centers. That also includes investments in chips, connecting cables and renewable energy.

    The existing cloud data centers are much smaller than the AI and data center hub that Google is considering building and operating in Australia.

    The proposed AI and data center hub would be of a similar scale to the huge 1 gigawatt AI data hub in India that ✅ Google committed to in October at an estimated cost of USD 15 billion (AUD 21.5 billion) between now and 2030. [AFR 16 Mar 2026]


    🇲🇾 AirTrunk's Kuala Lumpur Data Center


    Australia's Dynamic and Unpredictable Tax Policy

    Australia has been more aggressive than many jurisdictions on:

    That creates uncertainty, which is often worse than high tax rates.

    Data Center Power and Water Usage Threat to Urban Population Resources and Supply

    By 2027, AI and data center operations globally are projected to consume between 4.2 and 6.6 billion cubic metres of water annually. That’s equivalent to around 30–45% of Australia’s entire yearly water consumption. This surge has occurred in just a few years, reflecting the exponential rise of AI workloads and the infrastructure needed to power them. [Sphere Infrastructure: 10 Sep 2025]

    GOOGLE

    ✅ Google has told the federal government that it is withholding an AUD 20 billion investment in a massive Australian artificial intelligence and data center hub because of the risk of exposing its broader operations to higher taxes. Google is assessing where to build its Asian hub, and Australia is among the leading candidates due to abundant land and sun, as solar power is likely to be used to power the data center.

    Tax was one of the key discussion points, according to a Treasury briefing prepared for Treasurer Chalmers before the meeting and released on 7 Mar 2026 in response to a freedom of information request. Google is particularly sensitive about perceptions that it is seeking special tax treatment. [AFR: 12 Mar 2026]

    AIRTRUNK

    AirTrunk’s expansion in Melbourne follows its announcement of a new hyperscale campus in Osaka, Japan, delivering up to 100MW of IT load in Japan and a AUD 3 billion+ new direct investment in Japan.

    OSK2 and MEL2 – which will become AirTrunk’s 14th and 15th data centers respectively – expand the company’s hyperscale platform to deliver a total capacity in excess of 2.6 GW across 6 markets in Asia Pacific and Middle East: Australia, Singapore, Japan, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia.

    AirTrunk’s Melbourne expansion comes as Australia advances its 📘 National AI Plan, released on 2 Dec 2025, which outlines the country’s ambition to become a global hub for artificial intelligence. The plan is built around three pillars:

    • capturing the opportunity through investment in infrastructure and skills,
    • spreading the benefits across industries and communities, and
    • keeping Australians safe through responsible AI governance.

    By delivering a new hyperscale data center in Melbourne, AirTrunk is directly supporting these national goals, enabling smarter government services, faster business innovation, and stronger human connection, while creating opportunities for local talent and suppliers.
    🔺 AirTrunk 24 Dec 2025

    AirTrunk

    AirTrunk has 13 data centers:

    Airtrunk is a hyperscale data center specialist providing a secure and reliable solution for cloud, content and large enterprise customers to house high volumes of data and information. It is an example of strong private investment in data centers. AirTrunk was founded in 2015 by Robin Khuda and has remained privately owned for most of its life. Khuda was a founding member of ✅ NextDC. In Sep 2024, Airtrunk was acquired by funds manager Blackstone Inc and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board for about AUD 24 billion. Because of that buyout, Airtrunk continues to operate as a privately held portfolio company. ChatGPT comments: The landscape is oddly fascinating: real estate fused with hyperscale computing. [Blackstone's Sydney Office: Suite 5, Level 30, Governor Macquarie Tower, 1 Farrer Place, Sydney]


    🔺 Airtrunk's SYD3 data center in Western Sydney. Airtrunk is no longer listed on the ASX.

    🇦🇺 CDC Data Centres Pty Ltd

    CDC develops, owns and operates large scale data centers across Australia and New Zealand. It is not listed on the ASX.


    🔺 CDC's SYD3 data center at Eastern Creek, Western Sydney.

    Goodman Group

    Goodman Group operates data centers in Tokyo, Hong Kong and Frankfurt. It also operates data center power banks in USA (San Jose, Los Angeles), Europe (London, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Paris, Milan, Barcelona, Madrid), Hong Kong, Japan (Tokyo, Osaka), 🇦🇺 Australia (Sydney, Melbourne) and New Zealand (Auckland). Goodman is Australia’s largest developer of industrial property, strategically located with easy access to large consumer markets in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. Goodman is listed on the ASX as ASX:GMG.


    🔺 Goodman's SYD-01 data center at 🇦🇺 North Sydney.

    NextDC

    TechInvestment.com is an investor in ✅ NextDC.

    🇦🇺 ✅ NextDC has 17 data centers in Australia: Sydney (7), Melbourne (5), Brisbane (3), Perth (2).

    ✅ NextDC will join OpenAI in Australia as an infrastructure partner.


    🔺 ✅ NextDC's Port Melbourne data center.
    [This may be affected by ✅ NextDC's cancellation of its 2026 AUD 500 million fund raise]