Global Data Center RoundUp – September 2025
Inside $500B+ buildouts, energy bottlenecks, and sovereign-scale bets September revealed how capital, grids, and geopolitics are reshaping the next decade of AI infrastructure.
Welcome to Global Data Center Hub. Join investors, operators, and innovators reading to stay ahead of the latest trends in the data center sector in developed and emerging markets globally
Dear Friends,
Beneath the headlines of AI breakthroughs, a quieter but more consequential battle is underway: the struggle over the physical foundations of compute.
Over the past month, one trend has become undeniable: AI is no longer purely a technology race. It is a race for capital, energy, fiber, and regulatory advantage where who controls the inputs increasingly defines who controls the outcomes.
From North America’s $500B buildout to Oracle’s $300B AI inference signal, and from Macquarie’s 11GW Fermi campus bet to South America’s multi-gigawatt projects, the global map of data center strategy is being redrawn in real time.
Yet beneath these headline moves lies a harsher reality: grid reliability, cooling innovation, fiber chokepoints, and financial structures will decide which strategies scale and which stall. September’s stories explored these pressures and what they signal for the decade ahead.
In case you missed any of the insights, here’s the full roundup of what we published this month.
Substack
Deep Dives
Detailed breakdowns on risks, strategic models, and long-term shifts.
The 4 Types of Data Centers (And Who Uses Them) – [Read here]
What Really Powers a Data Center (And Why It Decides Who Wins the AI Race) – [Read here]
From CRAC to Liquid: Why Cooling Is Now the Biggest Risk (and Opportunity) in Data Centers – [Read here]
How Fiber, Peering, and Cross-Connects Create Moats in Data Centers – [Read here]
Big Market Shifts
Major strategic moves by hyperscalers and what they signal.
North America: The World’s Largest AI & Data Center Buildout Surges Past $500B - [Read here]
Middle East & Africa: AI & Data Center Buildout Surges Past $75B - [Read here]
South America: The $380B AI Race From Nuclear Bets to Multi-Gigawatt Cities - [Read here]
Oracle’s $300B Signal: The AI Inference Boom Few Expected - [Read here]
Infrastructure Fundamentals
Core constraints and capabilities shaping AI-ready compute.
Is DataBank’s $1.07B ABS the Model That Reprices Hyperscale Capital? - [Read here]
Who Really Wins From Macquarie’s $350M Bet on Fermi America’s 11GW AI Campus? - [Read here]
LinkedIn
The 4 Types of Data Centers (And Who Uses Them) - [Read here]
From CRAC to Liquid: Why Cooling Is Now the Biggest Risk (and Opportunity) in Data Centers - [Read here]
What Really Powers a Data Center (And Why It Decides Who Wins the AI Race) - [Read here]
Is BorderPlex’s $165B AI Data Center Campus Positioning New Mexico as the Next U.S. Hyperscale Hub? - [Read here]
How Fiber, Peering, and Cross-Connects Create Moats in Data Centers - [Read here]
North America: The World’s Largest AI & Data Center Buildout Surges Past $500B - [Read here]
Is OpenAI’s $300B Bet Enough to Make Oracle a Hyperscaler or Will Power Bottlenecks Decide? - [Read here]
Will Digital Edge’s $1B Thailand Bet Outpace Malaysia in the AI Race? - [Read here]
Twitter/X
BorderPlex’s $165B AI campus isn’t about New Mexico it’s about sovereign-scale infrastructure.
Anchored in microgrids, closed-loop cooling, 3,250+ jobs, and hyperscale tenants, this thread explores how Project Jupiter could become the U.S. prototype for AI campuses balancing politics, resources, and social license. [Read here]
NVIDIA’s growth isn’t about GPUs it’s about bandwidth.
Driven by the Blackwell ramp, NVLink and Ethernet expansion, hyperscaler adoption, and regional diversification, this thread explores how NVIDIA is shifting from sheer scale to durable growth, turning concentration risk and China policy into strategic levers for long-term resilience. [Read here]
South America’s AI expansion isn’t about future potential it’s about strategic sovereignty.
Built around Chile’s co-primary hubs, Mexico’s U.S.–LATAM connectivity, and Paraguay’s hydro-powered campuses, this thread explores how energy abundance, multi-cloud adoption, and smart capital are turning Santiago, Querétaro, and Asunción into the region’s next AI strongholds. [Read here]
The UK’s AI push isn’t about headlines it’s about sovereign-scale compute.
Structured as a quasi-public-private model blending state backing, tech anchors, and commercial execution, this thread explores how OpenAI and NVIDIA’s UK investments are testing whether sovereign-backed contracts can be bankable, tradeable, and globally replicable, potentially unlocking the next $100B in AI infrastructure. [Read here]
China’s AI data center push isn’t about ownership it’s about operational mastery.
Centered on hyperscale DCs tied to ByteDance across Beijing, Yangtze, and the Greater Bay Area, this thread explores how HEC is testing whether vertically integrated, sovereign-aligned players can convert cooling, power, and policy into fully utilized, bankable AI workloads potentially setting the benchmark for China’s AI infrastructure. [Read here]
Thanks for catching up with this month’s roundup.