Stargate Project’s first data center set for Abilene, Texas; OpenAI is already looking to hire

Stargate Projects First Data Center Set For Abilene Texas Openai Is Already Looking To Hire
  • The first data center of the Stargate Project will be located in Abilene, Texas »
  • Web hosting expert Karlo Knezovic from Pofii believes that the construction of AI-driven data centers will not impact traditional data centers in the U.S. »
  • OpenAI has started hiring for two positions, but it’s unclear what other job opportunities will be available »

The small city of Abilene, Texas, has long served as the manufacturing hub for the 19-county region that surrounds it. Now, it’s getting another addition: It’s been chosen as the launch site for Project Stargate’s first AI-driven data center.

Shortly after President Trump’s first day in the White House, he announced a massive AI infrastructure initiative with an investment of up to $500 billion, with a collaboration between OpenAI, Oracle, and SoftBank.

The goal is to continue advancing U.S. AI technology at a time when seemingly everyone is racing to the top of the AI mountain. Recent news like China’s startup, DeepSeek, is making waves in the space.

Oracle’s CEO, Larry Ellison, briefed the public on updates for the Abilene data center.

“Each building is a half million square feet. There are 10 buildings currently being built, but that will expand to 20 and other locations beyond the Abilene location, which is our first location,” Ellison said.

President Trump originally talked about a $20 billion investment in America’s data centers, but the recent partnership led to the creation of the Stargate Project. This boosted the investment to $100 billion, but as Ellison said, the goal is to expand the project to more than 20 data centers over the next five years with a total budget of $500 billion.

At the briefing, OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, added: “This will be the most important project of this era.”

“This is the beginning of [the] golden age,” said Masayoshi Son, the CEO of SoftBank.

Although it’s not clear how powerful the Abilene data center will be, Bloomberg News found that the city has set aside 875 acres of land for it, which is roughly the size of Central Park in New York City.

The Abilene data center is expected to cost about $1.1 billion, which involves construction on Lancium’s Clean Campus, a hub designed to support high-tech industries with low-cost renewable energy.

Despite this, developers of the Abilene site have submitted an application to build a natural gas plant that would supply up to 360.5 MW of power to the facility, according to news reports.

Does the Stargate Project affect the web hosting industry?

Data centers store vast amounts of information. In web hosting, that means billions of websites and all their data are housed in data centers worldwide. But with massive projects and $500 billion investments on the horizon, what does this mean for smaller players, like stateside web hosts?

Some voice concerns about data center rental prices becoming more competitive. But there’s a chance they might stay exactly the same — that’s the perspective of Karlo Knezovic, CEO of Pofii, a premium web hosting technology company.

“The rise of AI-focused data centers will likely have minimal impact on the traditional web hosting space,” Knezovic said. “While these advancements are impressive, they are highly specialized and neither practical nor cost-effective for everyday hosting requirements, such as running websites or small-scale applications.”

Wide angle view of small air conditioned computer room with racks and cable trays
A small data center can power hundreds of websites but isn’t equipped to handle the high-power demands of AI/ML systems.

AI-focused data centers are designed with specific needs in mind, primarily supporting AI tools and high-demand AI/ML applications. “These use cases are far removed from the needs of standard hosting,” Knezovic added.

The key differences lie in the hardware and infrastructure. Traditional web hosting data centers are optimized for CPUs, with lower power requirements and standard cooling systems designed to run websites and small applications.

On the other hand, AI/ML data centers rely on GPUs and TPUs to handle the extreme processing demands of training and running AI models, instead requiring advanced cooling systems and much higher power densities.

“The infrastructure for websites and typical online applications will largely remain unchanged,” Knezovic added. “For the foreseeable future, the traditional hosting industry is expected to remain relatively unaffected.”

Like two sides of a coin, the web hosting industry isn’t the only consideration. The other is how the Texas locals will be affected.

What the Stargate Project means for Abilene

The Stargate Project has begun hiring for its data centers. OpenAI is looking for a Data Center Sourcing Manager (Equipment & Vendors) and a Technical Program Manager (Infrastructure Strategy).

The question, though, is how the Abilene data center location will form the rest of the promised jobs. According to those same documents discovered by Bloomberg News, the site “must create at least 57 full-time positions earning an average wage of $57,600 annually.”

It’s unclear where the OpenAI jobs will actually be based — the blog posts mention San Francisco, but that may only refer to OpenAI’s headquarters. Regardless, the promise of 57 jobs isn’t exactly groundbreaking; it’s hardly a ripple. Abilene is known for its manufacturing hub, which alone employs around 3,500 people out of the city’s 82,000 population.

OpenAI is optimistic, though, stating in its official announcement that the Stargate Project is expected to “create hundreds of thousands of American jobs” in total. In a policy proposal from late 2024, OpenAI pitched that a 5-gigawatt data center could create 44,340 jobs in Texas with a GDP of close to $7.2 billion.

Another issue is so many of the jobs surrounding data centers come in during the construction phase. According to Business Insider, the Abilene construction is set to be finished by the end of 2025, providing less than a year of work for local craftsmen.

This may just be a sign of the new normal. Automation is already plowing its way through the rural regions’ job security, affecting sectors that still rely on human intervention (e.g., quality control and troubleshooting), such as agriculture, manufacturing, and mining industries.

U.S. map graph titled 'Figure 2: Percent of jobs at risk of automation in U.S. counties'
Although from 2017, this map from the Center on Rural Innovation highlights the ever-shrinking job market in America’s rural communities. The majority of areas falling in the 65-75% range are in the Midwest and Sun Belt regions.

But history tells us data centers aren’t exactly the most lucrative job creators. Aside from the fact that most are automated and don’t need much human interaction, the types of jobs data centers require are highly skilled, essentially squashing the odds of local residents making the cut.

A Virginia data center built by Microsoft hired very few local workers, opting instead to bring in outside technicians. Only about 25 local residents were employed, mainly in janitorial or administrative positions.

Microsoft, which backs OpenAI, also only employed 325 people across all its Texas data centers. But its goal is to have 791 full-time employees and contractors and nearly 3,000 construction jobs by the end of 2026.

What happens in Abilene could set a precedent for future Stargate Project builds. Until then, all eyes are on the city to see if it will, in fact, be the recipient of the promised job growth, or simply become the site for another venture staffed by outsourced experts.