{"id":79570,"date":"2026-05-30T21:51:27","date_gmt":"2026-05-30T21:51:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/?p=79570"},"modified":"2026-05-30T21:51:27","modified_gmt":"2026-05-30T21:51:27","slug":"softbank-says-it-will-invest-up-to-e75-billion-to-build-french-data-centers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/softbank-says-it-will-invest-up-to-e75-billion-to-build-french-data-centers\/","title":{"rendered":"SoftBank says it will invest up to \u20ac75 billion to build French data centers"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p id=\"speakable-summary\" class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">SoftBank Group <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/group.softbank\/en\/news\/press\/20260531_0\" target=\"_blank\">announced today<\/a> that it plans to spend up to \u20ac75 billion (around $87 billion) to expand data center capacity in France.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The goal, the firm said, is to develop and operate up to 5 gigawatts of additional data center capacity. The first phase of the plan involves building data centers in\u00a0Dunkirk (Loon-Plage), Bosquel, and Bouchain to deliver 3.1 gigawatts of capacity to the Hauts-de-France region by 2031.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">SoftBank, which is <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2025\/11\/05\/softbank-openai-launch-new-joint-venture-in-japan-as-ai-deals-grow-ever-more-circular\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">both an investor in and customer of OpenAI<\/a>, says this will be its largest AI infrastructure investment in Europe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In a statement, French economic minister Roland Lescure described the announcement as a \u201ctestament to President Emmanuel Macron\u2019s ambition to position France as a leading destination all along the AI value chain.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the United States, <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2026\/02\/25\/the-public-opposition-to-ai-infrastructure-is-heating-up\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">opposition to data center construction is heating up<\/a> over environmental concerns, as well as questions about how data centers affect the electrical grid and utility prices. Nonetheless, SoftBank earlier announced plans to build a data center in Ohio, <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2026\/02\/19\/softbank-to-spend-an-eye-popping-33b-to-build-huge-u-s-gas-power-plant\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">powered by a new 9.2 gigawatt natural gas plant<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n<hr>\n<p><strong>Published by Dralys Blog \u2013 Stories | Insights | Innovation<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Discover more on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dralysstore.com\" target=\"_blank\">DralysStore.com<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"pld-like-dislike-wrap pld-template-2\">\r\n    <div class=\"pld-like-wrap  pld-common-wrap\">\r\n    <a href=\"javascript:void(0)\" class=\"pld-like-trigger pld-like-dislike-trigger  \" title=\"\" data-post-id=\"79570\" data-trigger-type=\"like\" data-restriction=\"no\" data-already-liked=\"0\">\r\n                        <i class=\"fas fa-heart\"><\/i>\r\n                <\/a>\r\n    <span class=\"pld-like-count-wrap pld-count-wrap\">    <\/span>\r\n<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SoftBank Group announced today that it plans to spend up to \u20ac75 billion (around $87 billion) to expand data center capacity in France. The goal, the firm said,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":79571,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[601,38],"tags":[78,45,10],"class_list":["post-79570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence-innovation","category-e-commerce-shopping","tag-ai","tag-innovation","tag-technology"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-2224533087.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79570"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79572,"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79570\/revisions\/79572"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}