BlackRock and Nvidia group buys $40-billion Al data center

AN INVESTOR GROUP including BlackRock, Microsoft and Nvidia is buying one of the world’s biggest data center operators with nearly 80 facilities in a deal worth $40 billion to secure coveted computing capacity for artificial intelligence (AI).

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The purchase of US-based Aligned Data Centers from Australian Macquarie Asset Management on Wednesday is the first deal for the AI Infrastructure Partnership formed last year which includes Abu Dhabi-based fund MGX and Elon Musk’s startup xAI among its backers.

“With this investment in Aligned Data Centers, we further our goal of delivering the infrastructure necessary to power the future of AI,” said BlackRock Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Larry Fink, who also serves as the chairman of the Al Infrastructure Partnership.

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The acquisition is the latest in a series of big-ticket deals involving Big Tech and Silicon Valley startups that has been fueled by the boom in AI.

Major tech companies including Alphabet, Amazon.com, Meta, Microsoft and CoreWeave, are on track to spend $400 billion on AI infrastructure this year, Morgan Stanley estimates.