Fluidstack is in talks for a $5B Pentagon loan to build AI data centers

Why it matters

A $5B loan would make the Pentagon a major lender to commercial AI infrastructure, giving Fluidstack another pool of capital for data centers while exposing the government to the sector's construction and financing risks.

Fluidstack, the AI infrastructure provider founded by Gary Wu and Jamie Cox while they were at Oxford, is discussing a roughly $5 billion loan from the Pentagon, according to The Wall Street Journal. The founders are trying to convert customer commitments and power agreements into operating data centers.

The Wall Street Journal reported on September 10th that the proposed financing would come from the Department of Defense's Office of Strategic Capital. The transaction remains under discussion, and the Journal did not report a signed or closed loan. If approved at the reported size, it would be the office's largest loan to date.

The talks would bring the federal government into Fluidstack's effort to scale from an Oxford GPU marketplace into an operator behind large US AI infrastructure projects. They would also put public credit alongside the equity and infrastructure debt already financing the company's expansion.

From idle gaming GPUs to national infrastructure

Wu, an economics student, and Cox, who studied classics, started Fluidstack in 2017 after seeing AI researchers struggle to obtain computing power while gaming machines equipped with GPUs sat unused for much of the week. Cox left Oxford in 2018 to become a Thiel Fellow.

The founders initially aggregated available machines before moving into larger blocks of compute from corporate and academic facilities. Fluidstack later began managing clusters containing thousands of accelerators for AI developers. Forbes reported on September 3rd that the company generated more than $66 million of revenue in 2024, based on its UK filings.

Cesar Maklary, Fluidstack's co-founder and president, joined in 2020 after working on aerodynamics for a Formula One team. That experience became more relevant as Fluidstack moved from aggregating compute toward developing and operating data-center capacity, where construction schedules, cooling and power delivery determine whether contracted hardware can produce revenue.

Anthropic selected Fluidstack to build custom data centers as part of Anthropic's announced $50 billion US infrastructure investment. An investor memo cited by Forbes claimed Fluidstack could build a data center in three months, compared with at least a year for Google, Amazon or Meta. The memo projected the company would manage up to 1.3 gigawatts across more than 10 sites this year.

Fluidstack moved its global headquarters to New York in December 2025.

The Pentagon becomes a prospective infrastructure lender

The Office of Strategic Capital was established in December 2022 to attract private investment into technologies and supply chains considered important to national security. Congress later authorized OSC to issue loans and loan guarantees across 31 covered technology categories. Its first credit program focused on equipment financing for domestic manufacturing.

A $5 billion Fluidstack loan would push OSC well beyond a conventional equipment-finance program. AI data centers require land, grid connections, substations, cooling equipment, networking systems and large quantities of accelerators. Developers frequently commit capital years before a site produces revenue. Federal credit could give Fluidstack a longer or less expensive financing source than private debt markets, depending on the final interest rate, collateral, maturity and covenants.

Fluidstack already has substantial private backing. Forbes reported that Jane Street led a $1.5 billion round valuing Fluidstack above $18 billion, following a reported $750 million financing led by Situational Awareness at a $7.5 billion valuation. Forbes also reported, based on regulatory filings, that Fluidstack and its partners had accumulated more than $15 billion of debt for infrastructure projects. Fluidstack has not confirmed all of those financing terms.

The proposed Pentagon loan would exceed either reported equity round. Its economic meaning will depend on the final terms and which projects qualify for the proceeds. A loan secured against contracted data-center revenue carries different risks from financing capacity built before customers commit.

Palmer Luckey's bank takes a seat at the table

Erebor, the bank co-founded by Palmer Luckey (@PalmerLuckey), is advising Fluidstack on the proposed loan, according to the Journal. Luckey founded Oculus VR and later co-founded defense contractor Anduril, bringing experience in both venture-backed technology and US defense contracting.

For Wu, Cox and Maklary, the Pentagon talks follow a rapid series of larger customer commitments, financing rounds and construction plans. Their bet depends on delivering powered data-center capacity on schedule. OSC must now decide whether that execution record and the assets behind Fluidstack's projects justify a loan larger than any the office has made before.