$2 Billion Series C Sets European Record, But Nscale UK Flagship Supercomputer Site Still a Construction Yard

According to 1M AI News, the UK AI compute infrastructure company Nscale has announced the completion of a $2 billion Series C funding round, valuing the company at $14.6 billion. The company stated that this is the largest Series C round in European history. The round was led by Norwegian energy group Aker ASA and investment firm 8090 Industries, with participation from Nvidia, Dell, Nokia, Citadel, Jane Street, Point72, Lenovo, Astra Capital Management, and Linden Advisors, with Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan serving as placement agents. This round includes last year's $433 million pre-Series C SAFE in October.

Nscale also announced the addition of three new directors to its board: former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg (now co-founder of Sandberg Bernthal Venture Partners), former Meta VP Global Affairs and UK Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg (now a partner at Hiro Capital), and former Yahoo President Susan Decker (currently a director at Berkshire Hathaway and other companies).

Founded in 2024, Nscale operates data centers in the UK, US, Norway, Portugal, and Iceland, offering vertically integrated AI infrastructure from GPU compute, networking, to data services and orchestration software. Last summer, it partnered with Aker and OpenAI to build the Stargate-branded data center near the Norwegian Arctic Circle (anchored by OpenAI), reached a $14 billion expanded partnership with Microsoft in October, and confirmed considerations for an IPO in the same month.

However, on the same day as the funding announcement, an investigation uncovered doubts about Nscale's flagship UK project announced in January last year. The project, located in Loughton in the outskirts of London, was positioned as the "largest sovereign AI data center in the UK" and was part of Nscale's $25 billion investment commitment to the UK, originally planned to be operational in Q4 2026. Yet, when journalists visited the site in February this year, it was still being used as a storage yard by a scaffolding company. Nscale submitted a planning application at the end of February only after media inquiries, and land registry records indicate it has not been registered as the landowner, and the company cannot confirm if the land purchase has been completed. The UK's Department for Science, Innovation, and Technology stated that Nscale's $25 billion UK investment commitment "is not a formal contract but an intention to invest capital," and the government "has not been actively auditing these commitments." Nscale's 2025 annual financial report is overdue. An Nscale spokesperson responded that the Loughton project is "progressing as planned," with the company not only investing in the site itself but also in off-site power infrastructure, local contractors, and suppliers.