Sandberg and Clegg Join Nscale Board as 'Stargate Norway' Startup Hits $14.6B Valuation

As demand surges for data centers capable of delivering AI compute at scale, Nscale, a British AI infrastructure company backed by Nvidia, has reached a valuation of $14.6 billion. That positions it as one of Europe's newest decacorns, alongside Helsing and Mistral AI.

Nscale has staked its strategy on vertical integration, covering energy, data centers, compute, and orchestration software. Its latest valuation follows a $2 billion Series C round, which the company describes as "the largest in European history," although that figure includes a $433 million pre-Series C SAFE backed by Blue Owl, Dell, Nvidia, and Nokia in October.

The funding round was backed by Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan, a move seen as signaling IPO preparations — and not without cause: Nscale CEO Josh Payne told the New York Times that the company might pursue a public offering "as early as this year" to raise additional capital.

In addition to its funding and strategic plans, the company announced that former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg, former Yahoo president Susan Decker, and former UK deputy prime minister Nick Clegg are joining its board of directors.

Nscale is no stranger to large funding rounds and major announcements. In September, it announced a $1.1 billion Series B led by Aker. Aker, a publicly traded Norwegian company with energy interests, is also co-leading the Series C alongside New York-based investment firm 8090 Industries.

The companies also agreed that Aker's joint venture with Nscale will now be fully managed by the startup. Called "Stargate Norway," this AI infrastructure project based in Norway aims to run on 100,000 Nvidia GPUs by the end of 2026, with OpenAI as an initial customer.

According to Aker president and CEO Øyvind Eriksen, who serves on Nscale's board, "This step strengthens execution by placing delivery and governance under one roof, while maintaining continuity for the people and projects already underway."

Last October, Nscale also signed an expanded agreement with Microsoft to bring roughly 200,000 Nvidia GPUs to three data centers in Europe and one in the U.S., in collaboration with Dell.

Dell and Nvidia both took part in the Series C, along with Astra Capital, Citadel, Jane Street, Lenovo, Linden Advisors, Nokia, and Point72. Nscale expects the new funding to speed up the development of its AI infrastructure across Europe, North America, and Asia, while also helping the company grow its engineering and operations teams and strengthen its platform.

Beyond equity, the company also raised debt last month, securing a $1.4 billion delayed draw term loan backed by GPUs to finance some of its clusters across Europe. It aims to tap into growing enterprise demand and low-cost renewable energy, while reaffirming its commitment to reusing waste heat, developing local skills, and investing in regional infrastructure as part of Stargate Norway.