Nvidia weighs playing the cosigner for Nscale’s AI data center in West Virginia

Nvidia is in talks to guarantee billions in debt financing for AI cloud provider Nscale’s planned Anthropic data center in West Virginia, The Information reported Thursday . Bloomberg later corroborated the report. Anthropic has signed a $44.6 billion contract for the project’s first building alone, according to Nscale’s IPO filing . In essence, the chipmaker would be co-signing a customer’s loans, a sign of how hard the AI industry is working to keep its buildout plans afloat as investors grow jittery about the amounts of money involved.

The proposed arrangement would help Nscale secure financing for the electricity and construction costs of its West Virginia campus. Under what’s known as a residual value guarantee, Nvidia would step in if Nscale defaulted on construction payments, temporarily take over the facility, and help find a buyer and new tenant, according to The Information .

Nvidia’s earlier support for cloud providers has mostly covered leases and chip purchases, not construction.

Nvidia has been a major financial backer of the sector, extending roughly $170 billion in investments and credit support to neoclouds and large customers, according to The Information. That includes $1 billion in convertible financing committed to Nscale in September.

The stakes are high for Nscale, which is seeking to go public at a valuation of up to $35 billion despite growing concerns about its ability to deliver on ambitious data center projects.

Anthropic’s contract with Nscale covers the first 460-megawatt building at Nscale’s West Virginia campus, which is expected to use Nvidia’s next-generation Vera Rubin chips. The companies are also discussing a second deal worth roughly $45 billion for another building.

Nscale has struggled to get its projects off the ground. The company had about 25,000 advanced AI chips running in August , a fraction of the nearly 500,000 it plans to deploy. Its West Virginia campus has run into trouble of its own. Runoff from the construction site has flooded nearby homes more than once . In September, after months of negotiations , the project won state certification.