SoftBank will spend up to 75 billion euros (about $87.5 billion) building AI data centers in France, founder Masayoshi Son said in an interview published Saturday, ahead of President Emmanuel Macron's Choose France investment summit. It is the Japanese group's largest AI infrastructure commitment in Europe and its biggest such bet outside the United States.
What the money actually buys
The first tranche is 45 billion euros, earmarked for 3.1 gigawatts of capacity in the Hauts-de-France region by 2031. SoftBank named three sites in the north: Dunkirk, Bosquel, and Bouchain. The full program targets 5GW. For scale, Schneider Electric's chief executive said France had roughly 1.5GW of installed data center capacity heading into the end of 2025, so this is a large multiple of what already exists.
Dunkirk is the flagship. SoftBank is pairing with Schneider Electric there to build a manufacturing cluster for data center components, a port location that puts it within reach of London, Brussels, and Amsterdam.
Read the structure, not the headline number
Here is the part the press releases gloss over. SoftBank itself is not writing a 75 billion euro check. Son's group provides initial capital and brings in project partners who haven't all been named yet. A commitment spread across multiple years and phases gives SoftBank plenty of exits if conditions change, which is worth remembering given how many of its announced infrastructure projects, including the much-hyped Stargate venture, have yet to fully materialize.
The logic for Europe still holds up. The continent wants its own compute, and France offers the two things these facilities are starving for: cold land and abundant power. Son was blunt about the second one. "The fact that the country is an energy producer and exporter is absolutely crucial," he said, pointing at France's nuclear-heavy grid. Demand isn't the question here. Supply of cheap electricity is, and France has it.
How it came together
Son, 68, said he decided after meeting Macron during the French president's visit to Tokyo in April. By several accounts the two reached a preliminary understanding over dinner. The direct approach from a head of state apparently got Son's attention in a way the usual corporate pitches don't. Earlier reporting had floated a figure as high as $100 billion, so the 75 billion euro ceiling is large but trimmed from the most aggressive version.
The timing is not subtle. With a French presidential election less than a year out and the far right polling well, a megadeal announced at Macron's own summit is as much a political win as an industrial one.
Macron and Son are set to formally announce the investment at the Choose France summit, with the announcement expected Monday. Construction targets run to 2031, with one northern facility reportedly online as early as 2028.
