🇬🇧 United Kingdom: AI money in and out

FT: Microsoft gives up the option that would have more than doubled the Texas contract (tens of billions); the existing contract remains.

The Brookfield-Qai JV commits £2.5B to the 100 MW first phase of an AI data centre at Drax power station, delivered by Radiant; total could exceed £20B.

Nvidia is negotiating to guarantee Nscale's debt for a 460 MW data center to be used by Anthropic.

Bloomberg: talks for a second 460 MW Monarch facility; terms not final.

Nvidia commits $1 billion in convertible notes in Nscale's $3.36 billion pre-IPO round; Nscale leases capacity to Microsoft and Anthropic.

Third Point leads Nscale's pre-IPO round in convertible notes ($2.36 billion upfront plus $1 billion from Nvidia), with Apollo, Citadel and Abu Dhabi fund ADIC.

Nscale closes about $3.4 billion of pre-IPO convertible bonds, which convert into shares at listing (conversion cap at a $30 billion valuation).

Multi-year deal for 100,000 Nvidia Vera Rubin GPUs at the Barstow (Texas) site from 2027; Nscale also takes a stake in Figure. Nvidia is a shareholder in both.

Fluidstack, builder of Anthropic's Google-backed data centers, raises $1.5 billion led by Jane Street and rises to an $18 billion valuation.

Four GPU service contracts (Vera Rubin) at the Monarch campus, revealed in Nscale's S-1; Nscale has yet to finance them.

Microsoft gives up acting as anchor customer of the Loughton (Essex) site, about $3 billion, due to delays in the power connection. Approximate date.

After OpenAI's exit, Microsoft takes the capacity at Nscale's Narvik site, with more than 30,000 Nvidia Vera Rubin GPUs.

Arm sells its own chip for the first time, the AGI data center CPU: Meta is the main customer, with commitments also from OpenAI, Cerebras and SK Telecom.

Nscale takes over the 8 GW Monarch campus and Microsoft signs a letter of intent for 1.35 GW of Vera Rubin compute.

Round led by Aker and 8090 Industries with Citadel, Dell, Jane Street, Nokia, Point72 and Nvidia.

$2 billion Series C led by Aker and 8090 Industries, with Nvidia, Citadel, Dell and Jane Street: Nscale is valued at $14.6 billion.

The British autonomous driving startup raises with Mercedes, Stellantis, Nissan and existing backers Uber, Microsoft and Nvidia.

UK self-driving startup Wayve closed a $1.2B Series D led by Eclipse, Balderton and SoftBank Vision Fund 2, with Nvidia, Microsoft, Uber, Mercedes, Nissan and Stellantis; Uber adds up to $300M in milestone capital.

$7 billion lease for 245 MW in Louisiana; end customer Anthropic, payments backed by Google.

Custom data centers in Texas and New York built by Fluidstack, online during 2026; more sites planned.

168 MW joint venture at Abernathy (Texas) between TeraWulf (51%) and Fluidstack, with about $9.5 billion of contracted revenue over 25 years.

Orders signed between September 2025 and April 2026 running to 2033 (Texas, Portugal, UK, Norway); initially ~200,000 GB300s for ~$23 billion.

The British neocloud raises $1.1 billion with Aker, Nvidia, Nokia and Dell.

Fluidstack signs 10 years of colocation for 168 MW at Cipher's Barber Lake site in Texas: about $3 billion in contracted revenue.

Nvidia announced £2B to catalyse the UK AI startup ecosystem alongside Accel, Air Street, Balderton and others; reported recipients include Synthesia, Revolut, PolyAI and Latent Labs.

During Trump's state visit Microsoft pledged £22B (about $30B) in the UK for 2025-2028. Roughly half is capex for AI infrastructure, including the Nscale-built supercomputer at Loughton (23,040 Nvidia GB300 GPUs).

OpenAI is exploring offtake of up to 8,000 Nvidia GPUs in the UK (scalable to 31,000) at Nscale sites, under the US-UK technology pact.

Google opened its Waltham Cross data centre as part of a two-year £5B UK plan covering capex, R&D and Google DeepMind research.

CoreWeave added £1.5B to its UK commitment (£2.5B total), deploying Nvidia Grace Blackwell Ultra GPUs at DataVita's Lanarkshire campus.

Fluidstack signs two ten-year AI hosting contracts at TeraWulf's Lake Mariner campus (New York), for about $3.7 billion in revenue.

Data center in Narvik (Nscale-Aker JV) with 230 MW initially and 100,000 Nvidia GPUs by end-2026; OpenAI is the main customer (offtaker).

$2.4 billion acquisition closed a quarter early; Alphawave's CEO heads Qualcomm's data center business.

Fluidstack signed an MOU with the French government for a nuclear-powered 1 GW AI supercomputer: a €10B first phase hosting up to ~500,000 chips, from 2026.