Nvidia doesn’t just want to sell the chips powering the biggest AI data center project in the country. It wants to own a piece of the electricity keeping them cool.
The chipmaker, along with a consortium of other tech companies, is in advanced discussions to acquire a minority stake in Lancium, the Texas-based power infrastructure developer responsible for energizing OpenAI and Oracle’s Stargate campus in Abilene. The deal would value Lancium somewhere between $7 billion and $10 billion, with some estimates stretching as high as $14 billion.
From Bitcoin miner to AI power broker
Founded in late 2017, the firm originally built its business around flexible Bitcoin mining loads paired with renewable energy in Texas. The idea was elegant. Use cheap, surplus renewable power for mining, then curtail operations when the grid needed that energy back.
Lancium developed what it calls “Smart Response” technology for power management, essentially a system that lets data centers play nice with electrical grids by flexing their consumption up and down based on availability.
The company now markets gigawatt-scale “Clean Campuses” designed specifically for AI workloads. Its flagship facility, the Abilene Clean Campus (known as Stargate 1), can support up to 1.2 GW of capacity and accommodate around 400,000 Nvidia AI chips.
Blackstone currently owns roughly 50% of Lancium, having poured over $500 million into the venture. A previous minor stake held by Northern Data was sold for $30 million in late 2025. Now Nvidia wants in, not just as a chip vendor but as an equity partner with skin in the game.
Why power is the new moat in AI
The Stargate project itself was unveiled in January 2025 with backing from OpenAI, Oracle, and SoftBank. It represents somewhere between $100 billion and $500 billion in planned AI infrastructure spending, making it one of the largest technology buildouts ever attempted. Crusoe is developing the initial data center buildings on Lancium’s land, with Oracle and OpenAI serving as primary customers.
What this means for investors
Blackstone’s $500 million-plus commitment to Lancium, combined with Nvidia’s interest in taking an equity position, suggests that sophisticated investors increasingly view energy infrastructure as a core component of AI competitive advantage.
The risk, naturally, is execution. Building out 1.2 GW of capacity for 400,000 GPUs is an engineering challenge of staggering proportions. Initial expansion plans for the Stargate project were already modified once. And a valuation stretching toward $14 billion for a company that was mining Bitcoin just a few years ago demands a lot of faith in future cash flows. Investors should watch whether the minority stake deal closes, at what valuation it lands, and how quickly the Abilene campus reaches its full power capacity targets.
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