Trump bets big on AI and announces $500 billion in private sector investment

Donald Trump announced a huge investment for a new artificial intelligence (AI) project in the private sector. While initially reported by Reuters, the president formally spoke out about 'Project Stargate,' which would receive $500 billion and is estimated to create 100,000 jobs in the process.

The project is backed by OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle, who would create a new joint venture company based in Texas. Karoline Leavitt, the new Press Secretary, had anticipated that the formal announcement would be made from the White House. Sam Altman, Masayoshi Son and Larry Ellison joined the president during his speech.

Trump called the initiative the “greatest AI infrastructure project by far in history.” “It will ensure the future of technology. What we want to do, we want to keep it in this country—China’s a competitor, others are a competitor,” he added.

As for the energy needed to carry out the project, Trump said they could even “produce it in their own plants if they want to.”

The new joint venture, dubbed Stargate, would receive an initial investment of $100 billion from the tech giants, a figure that would increase to $500 billion over the next few years.

Altman, who attended Trump's inauguration on Monday, told Fox News last month that he believes Trump "will be very good" at attracting investment in artificial intelligence infrastructure to the US and said he looks forward to "working with his administration on it."

"Infrastructure in the United States is super important, AI is a little bit different from other kinds of software in that it requires massive amounts of infrastructure, power, computer chips, data centers, and we need to build that here and we need to be able to have the best AI infrastructure in the world to be able to lead with the technology and the capabilities," Altman said in dialogue with Fox News.