Alphabet’s Google announced on Friday plans to invest $40 billion in three new data centers in Texas, aiming to expand its infrastructure for artificial intelligence initiatives.One of the facilities will be located in Armstrong County in the Texas Panhandle, while the other two will be set up in Haskell County, a region of West Texas near Abilene.
The investment, spread through 2027, highlights the growing race among AI and cloud service providers to build the capacity needed to support increasingly advanced AI models.
"This investment will create thousands of jobs, provide skills training to college students and electrical apprentices, and accelerate energy affordability initiatives throughout Texas," Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Alphabet, mentioned in a statement. The firm plans to invest in its current Midlothian campus and the Dallas cloud region, which are part of its worldwide network comprising 42 cloud regions.
Google’s $40 billion investment marks its largest in any U.S. state and is expected to support energy efficiency initiatives and workforce development in Texas, according to the state’s announcement.
Tech giants are ramping up spending to strengthen AI infrastructure both in the U.S. and abroad. Anthropic announced a $50 billion investment in U.S. data centers, including locations in New York and Texas. Meanwhile, Google plans to invest €5.5 billion ($6.41 billion) in Germany to expand its data center capacity, reflecting a broader push to secure technological leadership globally.
Recent AI investment trends resemble previous tech bubbles, as valuations and expenditures exceed immediate returns, according to some analysts and investors. They caution that demand forecasts might be overly optimistic if AI adoption doesn't increase at the same rate as capital spending.
