Campus could total 1GW in future, company claims.
Japanese telecoms giant SoftBank has broken ground on a new data center in Tomakomai, Hokkaido.
Local press including Nikkei report SoftBank this week has begun construction of a large-scale data center in Tomakomai.Plans for the Hokkaido Data Center were first announced in November 2023 alongside its subsidiary, IDC Frontier. Up to half of the cost will be covered by subsidies from Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
The first phase of the $455.8m, 700,000 sqm (7.5 million sq ft) project will launch with an initial 50MW in 2026, with plans to expand to more than 300MW. Renderings suggest up to eight buildings will be developed. The company has suggested the site could total as much as 1GW in the future.
In addition to being used for in-house generative AI development and other AI-related projects, the data center will also be made available to a wide range of universities, research institutes, and companies.
“We will develop cutting-edge AI here. We will strive to make people think that a new Hokkaido has been born,” SoftBank CEO Junichi Miyakawa, told local press. He added: "We have secured land that can handle up to 1GW.”
Tomakomai City Mayor Shun Kanazawa said: "The construction of this data center is essential for the development of the city. As a local government, we will fully support this project."
Originally founded in 1986 and acquired by SoftBank in 2005, IDC Frontier operates data centers across the Tokyo metropolitan area (Tokyo Fuchu, Tokyo Ariake, Tokyo Nihombashi, Kanagawa Yokohama); Tohoku (Fukushima Shirakawa); Kansai (Osaka Suita); and Kyushu (Fukuoka Kitakyushu).
SoftBank is also set to develop a 150MW data center at the site of a recently closed LCD factory acquired from Sharp. KDDI is also developing its own facility on part of the site, located in the Sakai area of Osaka.
OpenAI and SoftBank are major investors in The Stargate Project, announced by OpenAI in January of this year. Both companies have pledged $19 billion to the project which expects to see $500bn invested in AI infrastructure in the US over the next four years, $100bn of which will be deployed "immediately."
