OpenAI is rethinking Stargate—just as data-center money keeps landing somewhere else. This is The Data Center Daily. Today: when the anchor tenant starts renting, who inherits the promises tied to the build? Plus, fresh capital in Brazil, an actual solar contract in Singapore, and a storage valuation that cuts through the AI-demand cheerleading. First: Stargate’s new shape. Here's Georgia Butler at Datacenter Dynamics:
OpenAI has restructured its leadership in light of its decision to rent more AI servers from cloud providers. The company is in the midst of a major data center buildout in the US and around the world through its Stargate project, being undertaken in partnership with Oracle and SoftBank. However, reports of late have suggested that the company is instead leaning more on renting AI servers from cloud providers and scaling back its build-out plans.
After the Stargate buildout vision we covered last edition, OpenAI is reorganizing around more rented cloud capacity. DCD reports three lanes now: design, commercial cloud and chip partnerships, and operating the facilities it uses. And Abilene is apparently capped at 1.2 gigawatts, versus that 2-gigawatt expansion figure. That leaves 800 megawatts out of the plan—who’s carrying the land, transmission-study, and permitting costs tied to it? Sachin Katti now oversees the Stargate groups, and the name has broadened into a strategy for bringing compute online. Conveniently elastic language when owned capacity turns into another company’s leased server fleet. Renting can make sense. But the cloud provider taking OpenAI’s workload still has to secure power, water, and wires—and those commitments don’t get less physical because the tenant changed its capital structure. Here's Fernanda Guimarães; Daniela Braun at Valor International:
Goldman Sachs, Itaú BBA and Bradesco BBI have been hired to find a new investor for data-center operator Ascenty, people familiar with the matter said. The process is still at an early stage. Ascenty is looking to raise about $1 billion through a primary transaction involving a minority stake. The proceeds would go to the company and help finance its expansion projects.
Ascenty wants about $1 billion for a minority stake, and the money goes into the company—not out to Brookfield or Digital Realty. A primary raise is a cleaner sign they’re funding growth than existing owners taking money off the table. Ascenty says its four AI data centers will cost $1.2 billion and add 150 megawatts, all fully contracted by global tech companies. Good. Now I want to know the contract shape: firm take-or-pay load, or customers reserving the right to change their minds when power gets expensive? Goldman Sachs, Itaú BBA, and Bradesco BBI are running the process, but it’s explicitly early stage. After the OpenAI build-to-rent reset, that matters: 150 megawatts may be contracted, but the $1 billion equity check is still being marketed. Brazil gets a real test of whether capital shows up here. If investors price those 150 megawatts aggressively, great—build it. If they haircut the value, “AI demand” still hasn’t solved the financing and grid-delivery problem. From Jonas Muthoni at Microgrid Media:
Equinix signed a new renewable-energy power purchase agreement with Flo Energy Singapore on August 18, 2026, that will add at least 11.5 MWp of rooftop solar capacity for its Singapore data-center portfolio, with an option to expand to as much as 50 MWp.
Equinix signed for at least 11.5 megawatts-peak from Flo Energy in Singapore. The 50-megawatt figure is just an option, so let’s keep the expansion banner folded until they exercise it. Exactly. A fourth Singapore renewable PPA in two years is a meaningful procurement program. Equinix says the portfolio could reach 215 MWp by 2028, with roughly 250,000 megawatt-hours annually across its Singapore agreements. Here’s the useful contrast with the OpenAI piece: a signed PPA tied to industrial and commercial rooftops, versus a big capacity headline treated like electrons have already shown up at the meter. Rooftop solar won’t turn Singapore into a 24-hour power plant. Still, 11.5 MWp contracted today beats 38.5 MWp of optimistic arithmetic. Here's Latitude Media:
And yet, Form raised its latest round at a $1.75-billion pre-money valuation, according to Axios: a significant downvaluation from the $3-billion pre-money valuation at which the company raised its Series F in October 2024.
Form Energy raised $750 million at a $1.75 billion pre-money valuation, down from $3 billion in October 2024. That’s a pretty specific markdown for a company with Minnesota construction underway, West Virginia manufacturing scaling, and more than $2 billion raised in total. Everybody says data centers need hundred-hour batteries. Fine—so why is the iron-air company raising at barely over half its last pre-money valuation while its order book is supposedly flying? Capital is pricing in a long wait between a promising battery and dependable project cash flow. Latitude’s investor source sees it as a lagging indicator of tighter private markets and money flooding toward AI, rather than a vote against Form. Which is awkward when the AI buildout is also being pitched as the reason long-duration storage should be irresistible. And after that OpenAI pivot, customers leaning toward rented compute may be less eager to bankroll multi-day power infrastructure themselves. The tax credits survived, sure. They don’t make financing costs disappear. If you’re enjoying The Data Center Daily, please subscribe and leave us a review wherever you’re listening. Reviews help other people find the show, and we’re grateful for your support.
We’re watching Equinix’s Singapore renewable-energy portfolio, which could reach 215 MWp by 2028 if the new PPA scales as planned.
Links to every story are in the show notes, so take a look at the ones that caught your attention. That’s The Data Center Daily for today. This is a Lantern Podcast.