Stargate Power Developer Lancium Seeks Minority Stake Sale
N.R. Finch
Lancium, the power-infrastructure developer behind OpenAI's Stargate project, is in talks with Nvidia and other tech giants to sell a minority stake at a valuation of $7–10 billion — a sign that the AI land grab has moved upstream from data centers to the power grid itself.
Who is Lancium, and why is it worth this much?
Founded in 2017, Lancium focuses on clean-energy technology. Its core asset: grid-interconnection rights — permits to draw large-scale power from the Texas grid — secured at strategic locations.
It is building power infrastructure in Abilene, Texas, for Oracle and OpenAI, making it a key supplier to the Stargate project.
This means → Lancium is not selling electricity. It is selling the right and the location to plug into the grid — scarcer than the land itself as interconnection queues grow longer.
Who is at the table, and on what terms?
The Information, citing people familiar with the matter, reports that potential buyers include Nvidia. The deal is structured as a minority-stake sale, not a full acquisition.
Enterprise value including debt is expected at $7–10 billion. Negotiations are ongoing; terms may change.
Anthropic also held exploratory discussions with Lancium's team, but the talks did not advance to formal deal negotiations.
How large is its power portfolio?
Beyond the Abilene campus, Lancium has a second major site in Childress County, Texas, with 1 GW of approved grid interconnection and tax-abatement status.
Filings by American Electric Power show letters of intent for roughly 8.35 GW of potential projects in the area, folded into AEP's $10 billion transmission-upgrade plan.
In plain terms = 1 GW powers about a million homes. An 8.35 GW pipeline signals this site is being planned as a future mega-scale power hub.
What does the funding trail tell us?
Lancium raised $500 million from Blackstone in 2024, followed by a $600 million debt financing last October.
This reflects a broader bet by top-tier financial institutions on "AI power access" as a standalone asset class — not a wager on Lancium alone, but on the entire power-scarcity thesis.
Why are tech giants buying power assets directly?
Earlier this year, Google acquired Intersect — a power and data-center developer — for $4.8 billion, becoming the first major tech company to directly own generation assets.
Intersect holds roughly 8–10 GW of power projects under construction or in development, with the earliest expected online by late 2028.
This means → longer interconnection queues and stronger local opposition to new projects have turned early-permitted developers into a seller's market. Lancium's final transaction price will set a key reference point for how high AI power-infrastructure valuations can go.
Content is for reference only, not financial advice.