Former Microsoft AI Infrastructure Lead Joins Nscale as President
December 5, 2025
In a significant move within the high-stakes AI infrastructure sector, Nidhi Chappell, the former head of AI infrastructure at Microsoft, has been appointed President of AI Infrastructure at Nscale. This executive transition underscores the intensifying competition for specialized talent as companies race to build and manage the vast computing resources required for advanced artificial intelligence.
Chappell, who announced her departure from Microsoft last week, was a key architect behind the infrastructure supporting Microsoft's major AI initiatives, including its partnership with OpenAI. Reflecting on her tenure, she stated, "What started as an ambitious idea grew into the world’s largest AI GPU fleet—supporting Microsoft, OpenAI, Anthropic, and some of the most exciting innovation happening anywhere in technology." Her move to Nscale, a company with which Microsoft has multiple multi-billion dollar contracts, highlights the deepening ties between hyperscalers and specialized infrastructure providers.
The scale of Nscale's operations is substantial. The company has a global plan to deploy 300,000 Nvidia GPUs. Its commitments include a $14 billion deal to support 104,000 Nvidia GB300 GPUs for Microsoft at a 240MW facility in Texas, which has expansion potential to 1.2GW. Furthermore, Nscale has a $6.2 billion agreement to provide compute for Microsoft in Norway and plans to deliver up to 12,600 GPUs at a data center in Sines, Portugal. Beyond Microsoft, Nscale is collaborating with OpenAI on two "Stargate" projects, including a planned 100,000-GPU deployment in Norway.
Chappell's appointment signals Nscale's aggressive ambitions in the global AI infrastructure arena. Her proven experience in scaling what became one of the world's largest AI supercomputing fleets will be crucial as Nscale executes on its multi-billion dollar, multi-continent deployment roadmap. This move also reflects a broader industry trend where top talent from cloud giants is being recruited by specialized firms to navigate the complex challenges of power, cooling, and supply chains inherent in building next-generation AI data centers.
Source: datacenterdynamics
Former Microsoft AI Infrastructure Lead Joins Nscale as President
