Nscale, the vertically integrated AI-infrastructure company, has secured an additional $790m of debt financing to continue building out its AI data centre in Narvik, northern Norway, the company said on Monday. The committed facility was provided by ABN AMRO, DNB, Eksfin (Export Finance Norway) and Nordea, with Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken (SEB) acting as Mandated Lead Arranger alongside the bookrunner banks. ABN AMRO, DNB, and Nordea acted as Bookrunners on the trade.
Alongside the committed amount, the facility carries an uncommitted accordion feature of a further $790m, earmarked specifically to fund a 115MW expansion at the Narvik site. Nscale described the Narvik project as the largest AI-infrastructure investment in Norway. This financing builds on a year of rapid funding momentum at Nscale. The company closed a $2bn Series C in March 2026, led by Aker ASA and 8090 Industries, and signed a $1.4bn delayed-draw term loan in February 2026.
The Norwegian financing also follows a recently signed agreement with Microsoft covering the Narvik campus. Beyond Norway, Nscale is rapidly expanding its European data-centre footprint. A separate flagship build is underway in Portugal at Start Campus's Sines site, where Nscale committed to supplying 66,000+ Nvidia Rubin GPUs to Microsoft, with deployment starting in late 2027. The company also has a 1.35 GW commitment with Microsoft, Nvidia, and Caterpillar at a flagship AI campus in West Virginia under the Monarch name.
Nscale describes itself as vertically integrated, with operations spanning energy, data centres, GPU compute and software. The company serves AI-native customers, enterprises, and governments, and emphasises operational efficiency and reliability as core selling points for those buyers. The bank syndicate behind the Norway facility is itself notable. ABN AMRO, DNB, Nordea and SEB are among the largest project-finance banks in the Nordic region; Eksfin's involvement reflects Norwegian state-backed export-finance support for data-centre infrastructure that uses Norwegian power and labour.
The Narvik project benefits from the region's cold climate and access to substantial Nordic hydropower capacity. Norway's abundant renewable energy from hydropower provides a significant competitive advantage for energy-intensive AI data centres, reducing both operational costs and carbon footprint. The country's stable political environment and robust infrastructure also make it an attractive location for hyperscale facilities.
Josh Payne, Nscale's founder and CEO, said in the announcement that the combination of recent financing rounds positions the company “at the forefront of global AI infrastructure, delivering scalable, high-performance capacity to meet rapidly growing demand for our services.” The CEO's confidence reflects broader trends in the AI infrastructure sector, where demand for GPU compute and data centre capacity is surging as enterprises and governments race to deploy generative AI and machine learning workloads.
Nscale's approach of owning and operating every layer of the stack—from renewable energy generation to chip-level software optimisation—differentiates it from pure-play data centre REITs or cloud providers. This vertical integration allows Nscale to control latency, cooling efficiency, and power usage effectiveness (PUE), which are critical metrics for AI workloads. For instance, the Narvik facility leverages free air cooling for most of the year due to the Arctic climate, resulting in a PUE as low as 1.1, far below the industry average of 1.6 to 1.8.
The $790m debt facility is structured as a project finance loan, a common mechanism for large infrastructure builds. Project finance typically involves non-recourse or limited-recourse lending, where repayment is secured against the project's revenues rather than the developer's balance sheet. The involvement of Eksfin, Norway's export credit agency, underscores the strategic importance of data centre exports for the Norwegian economy. Eksfin guarantees can lower borrowing costs for international investors and extend tenors beyond what commercial banks alone would offer.
While Nscale did not disclose the tenor, pricing or covenant terms of the new financing, industry benchmarks for similar Nordic data centre debt facilities range from 5 to 10 years, with margins of 150 to 300 basis points over SOFR or Euribor. The accordion feature of another $790m, if fully drawn, would bring total debt financing for Narvik to nearly $1.6bn, reflecting the massive capital outlays required to build AI-ready data centres at scale.
The Narvik site is part of a broader wave of data centre construction in the Nordics, which has seen investment from major tech players like Google, Facebook (Meta), and Amazon. Google has operated a data centre in Hamina, Finland since 2011, while Meta's data centre in Luleå, Sweden was one of the first hyperscale facilities in the region. Amazon Web Services (AWS) has also built facilities in Stockholm and Oslo. The Nordics' cool climate, low energy costs, and high renewable energy penetration make them ideal for energy-hungry AI workloads.
Nscale's timeline for the 115MW expansion at Narvik is not yet public, but typical data centre construction cycles range from 18 to 36 months. Given that the facility is already under development, the additional financing suggests that Phase 1 is advancing toward operational status, with the accordion feature ready to fund Phase 2. The company's relationship with Microsoft, which includes GPU supply agreements and campus-level partnerships, may accelerate deployment timelines as Microsoft seeks to secure capacity for its Azure AI services.
The AI infrastructure market is experiencing unprecedented growth. According to industry analysts, global spending on AI data centres is expected to exceed $50 billion annually by 2028, driven by demand from cloud providers, enterprise AI adoption, and government-funded sovereign AI initiatives. Norway's government has been proactive in attracting digital infrastructure, offering tax incentives, streamlined permitting, and support for connection to the national grid. The country's state-owned utility Statnett has prioritised grid upgrades in areas like Narvik to accommodate large industrial loads.
Nscale's success in securing such a large debt facility amid a tightening global credit environment is a testament to the perceived strength of the AI infrastructure asset class. Banks remain willing to finance well-structured projects with strong sponsors and credible revenue projections, especially when backed by long-term contracts with blue-chip clients like Microsoft. The inclusion of an accordion feature also gives Nscale flexibility to scale up quickly if demand materialises faster than expected.
Beyond Norway, Nscale's Portuguese Sines site is equally ambitious. Sines is a deepwater port city south of Lisbon with excellent transatlantic cable connectivity and access to renewable energy from solar and wind. The commitment to supply 66,000+ Nvidia Rubin GPUs—an advanced chip expected to succeed the Blackwell architecture—signals that Nscale is positioning itself for the next generation of AI hardware. The first deployment of Rubin GPUs is scheduled for late 2027, aligning with Nvidia's typical product cadence.
The West Virginia Monarch campus, with its 1.35 GW commitment involving Microsoft, Nvidia, and Caterpillar, represents a truly massive undertaking. Caterpillar's involvement suggests on-site backup power solutions, possibly using natural gas generators or hydrogen fuel cells, which are common in US data centres. The size of the campus would place it among the largest AI data centres in the world, on par with Google's and Microsoft's hyperscale facilities.
Nscale's rapid progress over the past 12 months—from a $2bn Series C to $1.4bn in debt to this $790m facility—illustrates the intense capital competition in the AI infrastructure space. Rivals like CoreWeave, Crusoe Energy, and Lambda Labs have also raised billions to build GPU clouds. However, Nscale's vertical integration and Nordic focus give it a unique cost advantage, particularly in energy costs, which can represent 30-50% of a data centre's total cost of ownership over its lifetime.
The company has not commented on whether the accordion feature is expected to be drawn within a specific window. However, the fact that the accordion is earmarked explicitly for the 115MW expansion suggests that Nscale plans to exercise that option relatively soon, possibly within 12 to 18 months. The Narvik region's ample land availability and existing grid capacity support such an expansion, while the financing syndicate's willingness to provide accordion terms indicates strong confidence in the project's viability.
In summary, Nscale's latest $790m debt deal, with a potential doubling to $1.58bn, underscores the accelerating pace of AI data centre investment in the Nordics. The company's ability to assemble a top-tier banking syndicate, secure state-backed export finance, and lock in strategic partnerships with Microsoft and Nvidia positions it as a leading player in the race to build the physical backbone of the global AI revolution. As demand for AI compute continues to surge, Nscale's vertically integrated model and prime Arctic and Iberian locations may prove to be decisive competitive advantages.
Source: TNW | Investors-Funding News