Foxconn and OpenAI team up to co-design and manufacture AI data center hardware in the US, aiming for 2,000 server racks per week by 2026.
Foxconn, best known as Apple’s supplier, has entered a strategic partnership with OpenAI to co-design and manufacture specialized AI data center hardware in the United States. The collaboration will focus on custom server racks, cabling, power systems, and cooling solutions tailored for AI workloads. Foxconn plans to invest between $1 billion and $5 billion to expand its US manufacturing footprint, with the goal of assembling up to 2,000 AI server racks per week by 2026. While there are no guaranteed purchase commitments, OpenAI will have early access to evaluate and potentially buy the new systems.
This move is significant as it reflects OpenAI’s growing need for reliable, high-performance infrastructure to support its expanding AI models and inference demands. For Foxconn, the partnership marks a strategic pivot beyond consumer electronics assembly into the rapidly growing AI infrastructure market. By establishing a dedicated manufacturing pipeline, the collaboration could help OpenAI maintain tighter control over supply, costs, and performance, addressing one of the key bottlenecks in the AI industry: access to specialized compute resources.
Source: Tech Startups