Japan is launching a $140bn investment scheme to accelerate AI data centre development, aiming to become the world's largest AI infrastructure hub outside the US and China. A trio of companies including Dell and Jera, the world's largest gas trader, have agreed to develop a $15bn, 400-megawatt data centre near Tokyo—the largest AI data centre project in Asia outside China.
Yukio Kani, global chief executive of Jera, stated the partnership aims to develop 3 to 4 gigawatts of AI data centres and gas power infrastructure within five years. He estimated 1 gigawatt costs $35bn to $45bn, implying an overall cost of $140bn. The project will be financed by Apollo and is expected to start operations around 2028 in Chiba, near Tokyo.
The initiative joins a global race to build data centres and create AI computing hubs beyond the US and China. Japan currently lags with just 1.7 gigawatts of data centre capacity compared to 29.2 gigawatts in the US and 8.5 gigawatts in China. The Japanese government targets ¥32.7tn ($206bn) of public-private investment in cloud computing by 2035.
Source: Financial Times Companies · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing