SoftBank Group’s CEO is expanding his plans to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. data center infrastructure — this time with Trump-branded industrial parks.
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Tech billionaire Masayoshi Son is finalizing a deal with the White House to build facilities that would manufacture artificial intelligence hardware on federal land, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing unnamed sources familiar with the discussions.
The factories would be funded by the Japanese government, which reached a trade agreement in July to invest $550B in the U.S. in exchange for lower tariffs. Under the deal, the U.S. decides where the funding goes and keeps 90% of profits once Japan recoups its investment.
The factories, which would be owned by the federal government, would produce equipment necessary to build data centers, such as fiber-optic cables. They would also ultimately manufacture AI chips.
Son and administration officials, including President Donald Trump and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, have had several meetings about the plan over approximately six months, the WSJ reported.
“President Trump’s relationships with business leaders across industries and geographies are playing a key role in securing the trillions in investments that are helping build America’s next Golden Age,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said in a statement to the WSJ.
Son’s initial vision was a $1T industrial city the size of Los Angeles in the Arizona desert. The blueprint, called Project Crystal Land, involved robot-operated semiconductor fabrication plans and worker housing.
Son has reportedly approached several companies about coming aboard the project. Among them is Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., which manufactures 90% of the world’s AI chips.
The company has already expanded operations in the U.S., agreeing in March to increase investments from $65B to $165B. However, it declined to participate in Son’s project, according to the WSJ.
Project Crystal Land has since been simplified and broken up into industrial centers spread across the country, but a finalized deal hasn’t been reached, according to the WSJ.
Son is already working closely with the Trump administration on AI manufacturing. After the election but before the inauguration, SoftBank announced that it would invest at least $100B in U.S. digital infrastructure over four years.
A month later, it added to the investment, partnering with OpenAI and Oracle in a joint venture that may invest as much as $500B in data center projects and infrastructure.
In August, SoftBank invested another $2B in Intel just days before the federal government took a 10% stake in the American technology company.
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