OpenAI Is Walking Away From Expanding Its Stargate Data Center With Oracle (cnbc.com)
- Reference: 0180945376
- News link: https://developers.slashdot.org/story/26/03/10/0510223/openai-is-walking-away-from-expanding-its-stargate-data-center-with-oracle
- Source link: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/03/09/oracle-is-building-yesterdays-data-centers-with-tomorrows-debt.html
> Artificial intelligence chips are getting upgraded more quickly than data centers can be built, a market reality that exposes a key risk to the AI trade and Oracle's debt-fueled expansion. OpenAI is no longer planning to expand its partnership with Oracle in Abilene, Texas, home to the Stargate data center, because it wants clusters with newer generations of Nvidia graphics processing units, according to a person familiar with the matter.
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> The current Abilene site is expected to use Nvidia's Blackwell processors, and the power isn't projected to come online for a year. By then, OpenAI is hoping to have expanded access to Nvidia's next-generation chips in bigger clusters elsewhere, said the person, who asked not to be named due to confidentiality.
In [2]a post on X, Oracle called the [3]reports "false and incorrect." However, it only said existing projects are on track and didn't address expansion plans.
CNBC notes: "Oracle secured the site, ordered the hardware, and spent billions of dollars on construction and staff, with the expectation of going bigger."
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2026/03/09/oracle-is-building-yesterdays-data-centers-with-tomorrows-debt.html
[2] https://x.com/Oracle/status/2030836138194129070
[3] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-03-06/oracle-and-openai-end-plans-to-expand-flagship-data-center
Oracle ... with Oracle (Score:5, Funny)
From the headline I'd say Oracle has some serious corporate dysfunction in its outer joins...
JoshK.
Re: (Score:2)
Given what they've been doing, one is forced to stop and think for a moment whether or not that's a typo. It is a typo, but yeah, still makes you think.
Re: (Score:2)
Needs the Spider-Man pointing at Spider-Man meme, wearing Larry face-masks.
LOL (Score:2)
Imagine throwing away billions of dollars.
And then when those other datacenters are nearing completion, they'll also never be used because they're just on the cusp of the next generation, and then when those are about to be turned on...
Re: (Score:2)
the AI will fix that imagination for you.
Re:LOL (Score:4, Funny)
But Larry Ellison needs those billions of dollars so his nepobaby can buy more movie studios!
Re: (Score:2)
It will get used. There is still high demand for GPU workloads on the big cloud providers by companies looking to do AI or other GPU enabled workloads but not at the OpenAI or Anthropic scale. It just won't be guaranteed 100% usage from one big customer.
Re: (Score:2)
Case planning an extraction from a half-built data center out in the desert
You don't hate Sam Altman enough. (Score:5, Informative)
OpenAI -> Closed AI, Non profit -> For profit, cash from Nvidia -> no cash from Nvidia, No developer jobs in 3 months -> Slightly less cringey version 5.3 in 3 months, refusing Pentagon money ->accepting Pentagon money, Stargate -> no Stargate.
Sam Altman is a dirty, lying cunt.
Happily, Open AI will soon go bust.
Re: (Score:2)
too big to fail?
Yes I do. (Score:2)
Pretty presumptuous of you to assume that I don't already hate Sam Altman at least as much as you do.
Interesting Strategy (Score:1)
You can be first to scale up or have the latest technology but not both and not expanding is not the same as cancelling. The current construction seems like a needed intermediary step before new GPUs become available so that they stay relevant. That said OpenAI seems to be comfortable with ChatGPT in its current 'name brand' position even when competitors like Claude, Grok, and Gemini are all meeting or exceeding its functionality rapidly.
Re: (Score:3)
UBO filter:
> slashdot.org###vibe-coding-bar
Re: (Score:1)
Nice one, thanks :)
Re: (Score:2)
also element zapper mode
Re: (Score:2)
At this rate, slashdot will just be nothing but GenAI ads top to bottom...
Samsung Samsung (Score:2)
I was hoping this was recursively odd like [1]Samsung not selling RAM to Samsung [slashdot.org].
Nope, just an uncaught typo.
[1] https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/12/04/1739230/ram-is-so-expensive-samsung-wont-even-sell-it-to-samsung
Gulf States (Score:2)
Funding was supposed to come from Gulf States as a quid-pro-quo for US military protection from Israel and Iran.
The real reason? (Score:2)
> because it wants clusters with newer generations of Nvidia graphics processing units, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Hmmm, is that the real reason? Do the new processors provide something so special that the software can't run on older ones? Or are the new processors just *faster* than the old ones? Would a cloud customer back out of a deal just because the hardware is a few months old? Maybe, but maybe it's an excuse to get out of the deal, and OpenAI doesn't want to disclose the real reason. Maybe this is another sign of the AI bubbles starting to burst.
Re: (Score:2)
A generation old chip for a cloud customer means inference takes a few extra milliseconds. For OpenAI it means their training jobs take extra weeks to finish, they're late to market, they got leap-frogged by competitors, etc..
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They're also going to wait *many* extra weeks because of backing out of this deal, they won't be able to provision the new fancy chips instantly. On one hand, slower chips that take longer to process training, and on the other, logistics that take longer to even *start* training.
Real reason: they now have to pay the actual costs (Score:2)
Quietly having the energy companies pass the buck onto us plebs is over, we are on to your scam. And OpenAI doesn't want to pay for it either.
Editing (Score:2)
> Oracle Is Walking Away From ... Oracle
Someone needs a bit more coffee.
Re: Editing (Score:3)
If Oracle were to sue Oracle, will that create a black hole?
Re: Editing (Score:5, Funny)
No, a wormhole. It is a Stargate after all.