SpaceX is boldly investing $40 billion in the construction of AI computing power infrastructure. This financial leasing transaction, led by Apollo Global Management, will introduce NVIDIA's latest Vera Rubin chips, indicating that this commercial aerospace giant is making a major expansion into the field of artificial intelligence.
According to Bloomberg, SpaceX has signed a GPU and related equipment financing lease agreement with Apollo Global Management, with the total estimated lease payment amount being around $40 billion. This agreement is aimed at providing hardware support for SpaceX's computing power expansion plan, which the company positions as a key move towards a "super intelligent future."
This transaction is of a substantial scale, with several top financial institutions participating in it. Goldman Sachs acted as the exclusive structural design advisor, while BlackRock, Goldman Sachs Asset Management, and accounts under KKR served as the main commitment parties for financing. The transaction is expected to be completed by the end of this year.
Transaction structure: Delivery in batches, with a lease term of approximately five years.
According to the agreement, SpaceX signed a binding commitment letter with Apollo to enter into a main finance lease agreement. Under this framework, Apollo will be responsible for purchasing data center equipment and leasing it to SpaceX. The equipment will be delivered in batches, with each batch corresponding to an independent lease plan, and the lease term is approximately 5 to 5.25 years.
Each batch of leasing plans is expected to be launched successively in the first half of 2027. The final signing of the main finance lease agreement still requires meeting several pre-delivery conditions, and all parties involved in the transaction expect that these conditions will be met within this year.
Chip Selection: Betting on NVIDIA's Next Generation Vera Rubin Architecture
The NVIDIA Vera Rubin chip selected this time is NVIDIA's next-generation flagship product for data centers, representing the current cutting-edge level of AI computing hardware. This indicates that the construction of computing infrastructure serves the company's defined goal of a "super intelligent future," showing that the company is treating AI capabilities as strategic assets beyond its core aerospace business.
This $40 billion financing round was led by Apollo Global Management, with Goldman Sachs participating deeply as the exclusive structural design advisor. Funds and accounts under BlackRock, Goldman Sachs Asset Management, as well as entrusted accounts under KKR, all made commitments as major anchor investors, highlighting the high recognition of this ultra-large-scale AI infrastructure financing project by leading institutions on Wall Street. For the participants, such long-term equipment finance leases provide a stable cash flow asset exposure linked to the AI computing power expansion cycle.
