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The news comes only a day after the newly appointed president repealed Joe Biden’s Safe, Secure and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence executive order.
In a White House press conference, recently appointed president Donald Trump announced private sector funding of $500bn to be invested into OpenAI’s infrastructure over the next four years. The Stargate Project’s initial equity funders include OpenAI, Oracle, MGX and SoftBank, with Microsoft, Nvidia and Arm among the key technology partners.
Trump’s announcement comes directly after he repealed former president Joe Biden’s AI safety order, which aimed to implement safeguards for how AI technology is developed and deployed. Concern is growing in relation to the implications of AI if it is to exist in a space without the appropriate safety measures, with Trump’s decision prompting criticism from the Centre for American Progress.
In a statement, OpenAI said that the investment will “secure American leadership in AI, create hundreds of thousands of American jobs and generate massive economic benefit for the entire world”, reindustrialising the US and providing strategic capability to protect the national security of the region and its allies.
$100bn is to be invested immediately and the construction of 10 data centres in Texas is already underway.
Trump’s policies this time around, have been heavily focused on technology. Less than a day after the US TikTok ban was to go into effect, it was announced that a deal had been reached to halt the ban for 75 days. Additionally, he has controversially given government positions to several high-profile figures in the technology space.
At the press conference, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman praised Trump, saying “for AGI [artificial generative intelligence] to get built here … we wouldn’t be able to do this without you, Mr President”.
It was recently revealed that the partnership between OpenAI and Microsoft had been altered, with Microsoft no longer the exclusive provider of data centre infrastructure for OpenAI. While Microsoft retains the “right to first refusal”, OpenAI can seek help elsewhere if the technology platform can’t meet its cloud computing capacity needs.
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