Forget mega yachts, AI data centers are quickly becoming the next
battleground for billionaires as Zuckerberg pledges $65 billion CAPEX spend
in 2025

Date:
Thu, 30 Jan 2025 18:34:00 +0000

Description:
Meta is investing big bucks in AI infrastructure, but it's up against bigger spending rivals.

FULL STORY ======================================================================Followin g $500 billion Project Stargate launch, Meta is also dolling out the dollars Meta's $65 billion is lower than Microsoft's $80 billion commitment AWS is
set to spend more than $75 billion while Google has yet to say how much it will spend

If you have a few hundred billion dollars burning a hole in your pocket,
youre probably considering spending it on an AI data center or two. US President Donald Trump recently announced OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle would launch a new AI infrastructure venture called Project Stargate , investing $500 billion over four years across the US. OpenAI noted that $100 billion would be made available immediately.

Elon Musk, no stranger to building AI data centers and perhaps a bit miffed about being left out, claimed that Project Stargate doesnt actually have the money , stating, SoftBank has well under $10 billion secured.

While that was unfolding, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg made an announcement on Facebook, revealing the company is building a 2GW+ data center so large it would cover a significant part of Manhattan, while also outlining other AI plans. A defining year for AI

Zuckerberg's full post reads : This will be a defining year for AI. In 2025,
I expect Meta AI will be the leading assistant, serving more than 1 billion people. Llama 4 will become the leading state-of-the-art model, and well
build an AI engineer that will start contributing increasing amounts of code to our R&D efforts. To power this, Meta is building a 2GW+ data center so large it would cover a significant part of Manhattan. Well bring online ~1GW of compute in '25 and end the year with more than 1.3 million GPUs. Were planning to invest $60-65 billion in capex this year while also growing our
AI teams significantly, and we have the capital to continue investing in the years ahead. This is a massive effort, and over the coming years, it will drive our core products and business, unlock historic innovation, and extend American technology leadership. Lets go build!

$65 billion on capital expenses certainly isnt nothing, but it pales in comparison to the $80 billion Microsoft plans to invest in fiscal 2025 or the $75 billion-plus AWS intends to spend this year. We don't know how much
Google will be pumping into AI infrastructure, but it's going to be a similar figure.

That said, Meta's investment is higher than most would have expected. Reuters points out: The $60 billion to $65 billion capital spending outlined for 2025 would mark a significant jump from the company's estimated expenditure of $38 billion to $40 billion last year. It is also above analysts' estimates of $50.25 billion for 2025, according to LSEG data. You might also like Weve listed the best AI tools and best AI writers you can use today Check out our roundup of the best cloud computing services OpenAI signs deal with Oracle, Softbank for $500bn expansion across US



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/pro/forget-mega-yachts-ai-data-centers-are-quickly-b ecoming-the-next-battleground-for-billionaires-as-zuckerberg-pledges-usd65-bil lion-capex-spend-in-2025


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