The negotiation and the parties involved
Brightspeed, a U.S. provider of internet-based telecommunications services, is in talks with Nvidia about the possibility of converting numerous obsolete telephone buildings into small data centers. The report, attributed to The Information and picked up by IT之家, indicates that the idea originated with Nvidia itself, which proposed it to Apollo Global Management, Brightspeed's parent company. Apollo then reportedly asked Nvidia for a written plan, which the chip company has already delivered, initiating a phase of gathering further information and requesting to visit the facilities.
Declared figures and technical limits
Brightspeed has about 130 properties in the United States, most of them used for handling data and voice traffic. According to estimates attributed to Nvidia, the set of these facilities could offer computing capacity of about 1 gigawatt and host more than 2,200 Supermicro Vera Rubin NVL72 racks, each consisting of 72 Rubin GPUs and 36 Vera CPUs. This is, however, a forecast, not a measured result.
The material clarifies that the existing power availability would be sufficient to run the GPUs, but the conversion would not be limited to installing the machines: cooling systems and other ancillary infrastructure would be needed. Permits and approvals from local authorities would also remain necessary. The cited advantage is procedural: compared with building from scratch, reuse would involve fewer permitting steps and less community opposition.
Why it matters and what is missing
The project fits into a broader trend: according to the source, OpenAI and Anthropic are also reportedly considering building smaller data centers, especially as large facilities face delays and local resistance. Reusing existing properties could therefore become an alternative way to add capacity without new sites. The text nevertheless notes that, for training artificial intelligence models, concentrating large homogeneous clusters in a single location remains the preferable option.
No timelines, amounts, actual number of buildings involved, or outcome of due diligence are indicated. It is not confirmed that the agreement will be signed, that all 130 properties are convertible, or that the 1 GW estimate is achievable. The news should therefore be read as an ongoing negotiation, based on a submitted plan and preliminary assessments, not as an approved investment.
