Sandberg, Clegg join Nscale team as ‘Stargate Norway’ startup hits $14.6B

Amid the growing demand for data centers that can deploy AI computing at scale, Nvidia-backed British AI Infrastructure company Scale now its value is $14.6 billion. This makes it one of the most recent decacorns in Europe Helsinki and Mistral AI.

Nscale has bet on vertical integration, from power and data centers to compute and orchestration software. Its new calculation is based on $2 billion Series Cwhich calls it “the largest in European history,” although the number includes a $433 million pre-Series C SAFE supported by Blue Owl, Dell, Nvidia and Nokia in October.

The upgrade was supported by Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan, whose involvement has been interpreted such as preparing for an IPO – not without reason: CEO of Nscale Josh Payne he told the New York Times his company may seek to go public “as early as this year” to raise capital.

Along with its funding and plans, the company also announced that former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg, former Yahoo President Susan Decker, and UK Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg will join its team.

Nscale is not the only newcomer to the big leagues and announcements. In September, it announced $1.1 billion Series B led by Aker. Aker is a Norwegian public company with strong interests and is also leading the Series C alongside New York-based 8090 Industries.

The companies also agreed that Aker’s partnership with Nscale will now be fully managed and launched. Named “Stargate Norway,” this Norwegian-based AI project has a purpose running on 100,000 Nvidia GPUs by the end of 2026and OpenAI as first customer.

According to Aker’s president and CEO, Øyvind Eriksen, who sits on Nscale’s board, “the division strengthens operations by placing leadership and management under one roof, and makes people and operations more sustainable.”

Last October, Nscale also signed additional contract and Microsoft to bring nearly 200,000 Nvidia GPUs to three data centers in Europe and one in the US, in partnership with Dell.

Dell and Nvidia both participated in the Series C round, as did Astra Capital, Citadel, Jane Street, Lenovo, Linden Advisors, Nokia, and Point72. Nscale expects the new investment to accelerate the development of AI in Europe, North America, and Asia, while helping the company expand its engineering and operations teams, and strengthen its platform.

Equity aside, the company also raised debt last month, and $1.4 billion in delinquent loans with the help of GPUs to support its other teams in Europe. It aims to capitalize on rising business demand for low-cost renewable energy while renewing its promise to reuse waste heat, develop local skills, and invest in regional infrastructure as part of Stargate Norway.