Nvidia leads Firmus financing, US$500 million to help expand AI computing power
Announced an investment of approximately US$500 million in Australian AI cloud infrastructure company Firmus Technologies, becoming the largest investor in its US$2 billion financing round. The investment was made in the form of preferred shares, which are expected to be converted into ordinary shares when Firmus is listed on the Australian Securities Exchange. The post-money valuation will be approximately US$15.5 billion, nearly double the previous valuation. Firmus plans to use the funds to purchase Nvidia chips for a data center project in Launceston and to support its overall expansion plans in Australia. The company has convened a special meeting of shareholders on July 31 to approve the financing and the 50-to-1 share split plan, which aims to lower the per-share price before the IPO and facilitate the participation of retail investors. This investment is the latest manifestation of Nvidia’s strategy to build an AI infrastructure ecosystem independent of traditional cloud giants. Previously, Nvidia has invested in computing power service providers such as CoreWeave through similar models. Industry insiders analyze that through the triple means of capital, chip supply and cloud platform, Nvidia is extending its reach from simply selling hardware to the entire AI computing power value chain. For Nvidia, this investment will not only provide financial returns after Firmus goes public, but more importantly, it will lock in a large demand for Nvidia GPUs in the future. Firmus plans to build a 360MW AI factory in Batam, Indonesia, deploying up to 170,000 Nvidia AI acceleration chips, and is expected to generate committed revenue of US$25 billion to US$30 billion within six years. Firmus co-CEO Tim Rosenfield said that this move will help narrow the computing power acquisition gap between small AI companies and industry giants, providing emerging companies with a fairer competitive opportunity.