CoreWeave announced Thursday its biggest expansion yet with OpenAI, signing a $6.5 billion deal that brings their total agreements to $22.4 billion. This marks the third time this year the cloud computing company has expanded its partnership with the ChatGPT maker.
The New Jersey-based company first struck a deal with OpenAI in March worth $11.9 billion. They added another $4 billion agreement in May. Now this latest contract pushes their combined value to over $22 billion, making CoreWeave one of OpenAI’s most important infrastructure partners.
“This milestone affirms the trust that world-leading innovators have in CoreWeave’s ability to power the most demanding inference and training workloads at an unmatched pace,” said CoreWeave CEO Michael Intrator. The deal will help OpenAI train what the companies call “next-generation” AI models that require massive computing power.
CoreWeave makes money by renting out data centers packed with thousands of Nvidia graphics processing units. These specialized computers are essential for training AI systems like ChatGPT. The company went public in March and has seen its stock price jump 230% since then, though shares dropped slightly on Thursday after the announcement.
At the time of its prospectus, CoreWeave said it operated 32 datacenters powered by more than 250,000 Nvidia GPUs. Their facilities span across the United States and parts of Europe, including the United Kingdom, Spain and Sweden.
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The timing of this deal aligns with OpenAI’s broader infrastructure push called Stargate. OpenAI, Oracle, and SoftBank are announcing five new U.S. AI data center sites under Stargate, OpenAI’s overarching AI infrastructure platform. The project aims to secure 10 gigawatts of computing capacity through investments that could reach $500 billion.
To put this in perspective, a typical nuclear power plant generates about one GW of power. So OpenAI is essentially planning data centers that would need the electricity output of ten nuclear plants. Under the current version of the agreement, OpenAI will look to build and deploy data centers requiring a combined 10 gigawatts of power capacity, the equivalent of enough energy to power more than 8 million homes in a single year.
This massive expansion comes as companies across the AI industry face severe computing shortages. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently told CNBC that “the compute constraints faced by the AI company and industry have been terrible. We’re so limited right now in the services we can offer.”
The deal also highlights the complex web of relationships in the AI world. Microsoft, which has invested billions in OpenAI, accounts for about 70% of CoreWeave’s revenue. Meanwhile, Nvidia has invested in CoreWeave and owns more than 5% of the company. Earlier this week, Nvidia announced a $100-billion investment in OpenAI to support its datacenter buildout using the chipmaker’s AI processors.
Some industry analysts worry about this concentration of partnerships. “Enormous customer concentration is coming, as we think NVDA and OAI will be CRWV’s only core customers by the end of 2027,” warned Hedgeye Risk Management in a research note.
CoreWeave has been expanding rapidly beyond just renting computing power. The company recently committed £1.5 billion to advancing AI technology in the UK and launched CoreWeave Ventures to invest in AI startups. They’re also building new facilities, including a $6-billion deal for an initial 100 megawatt datacenter in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and a multibillion-dollar commitment to building up AI datacenter capacity in the U.K.
OpenAI’s infrastructure needs continue growing as ChatGPT usage has expanded dramatically. The company plans to use its partnerships with CoreWeave, Oracle, and SoftBank to meet this demand while building toward more advanced AI systems that require even more computing power.
This deal represents more than just business expansion. It shows how AI companies are making massive bets on infrastructure to stay competitive. For families and businesses using AI tools, this means potentially faster and more reliable access to services like ChatGPT as more computing capacity comes online. Meanwhile, tech giants continue integrating AI into everyday applications, as seen with Google‘s latest developments.
The announcement was shared across social media platforms, with CoreWeave posting updates on Twitter to keep stakeholders informed. As the AI industry continues evolving rapidly, with new developments like the upcoming iPhone innovations, infrastructure partnerships like this one will remain crucial for meeting growing computational demands.
