Australian data center construction firm Firmus secures over 500 million US dollars in financing, with partner NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA.US) participating.

Australian data center construction firm Firmus Technologies raised $505 million in a funding round led by Coatue Management LLC. Firmus announced on Monday that this deal valued the company at $5.5 billion. As the dominant player in AI chips and a partner of Firmus, NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA.US) also participated in this funding round. NVIDIA Corporation often collaborates with venture capital firms and has invested billions of dollars in AI companies. Their goal is to help cultivate an industry ecosystem that has already been driving explosive sales growth, positioning NVIDIA Corporation as the world's most valuable company. Similar to the Firmus funding, NVIDIA Corporation also supports companies that purchase their products. Despite some investors expressing concerns about the cyclical nature of these transactions, NVIDIA Corporation has defended their approach. This funding will be used to rapidly deploy AI hardware based on the upcoming NVIDIA Corporation computing technology in the Asia-Pacific region. Firmus currently has data center projects in Australia and Singapore. Including this latest deal, the company has raised $1.35 billion in the past six months. Firmus is leading a project called Southgate, which aims to build renewable energy-powered data center capacity in Australia, with the first site located in Tasmania. Once the first two phases of technical deployment are completed, the facility will deploy computers with 36,000 NVIDIA Corporation accelerator chips. These high-performance processors will help develop and run AI models by inputting data from Beijing Vastdata Technology. This Australian project aligns with NVIDIA Corporation CEO Jensen Huang's push for a "sovereign AI" strategy, which involves building local data centers to enable countries and companies to keep their data within their own borders. Huang views this field as a key growth direction for NVIDIA Corporation. Firmus is adopting the Vera Rubin DSX, a design provided by NVIDIA Corporation for building their so-called "AI factory." Vera Rubin is the codename for NVIDIA Corporation's next generation chips and computers, with shipments set to begin in the second half of this year. Previously, Firmus stated that the Southgate project had attracted a global "hyperscaler" customer. The world's largest alternative asset management firm, Blackstone, also provided financing support for this project.