ABILENE, Texas (Reuters) -OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank on Tuesday announced plans for five new artificial intelligence data centers in the United States to build out their ambitious Stargate project.

U.S. President Donald Trump in January hosted top tech CEOs to launch Stargate, a private-sector initiative that plans to spend up to $500 billion to build AI infrastructure. 

AI is a priority for Trump and tech companies that are pouring billions into building the computers that are necessary to power the technology. 

ChatGPT-maker OpenAI said on Tuesday it will open three new sites with Oracle in Shackelford County, Texas, Dona Ana County, New Mexico and an undisclosed site in the Midwest. Two more data center sites will be built in Lordstown, Ohio and Milam County, Texas by OpenAI, Japan's SoftBank and a SoftBank affiliate. 

The new sites, the Oracle-OpenAI site expansion in Abilene, Texas, and the ongoing projects with CoreWeave ( CRWV ) will bring Stargate's total data center capacity to nearly 7 gigawatts and more than $400 billion in investment over the next three years, OpenAI said. 

The $500 billion project was intended to generate 10 gigawatts in total data center capacity.

"AI can only fulfill its promise if we build the compute to power it," OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a statement.

The Tuesday's announcement, expected to create 25,000 onsite jobs, follows Nvidia saying on Monday that it will invest up to $100 billion in OpenAI and supply data center chips. 

OpenAI and partners plan to use debt financing to lease chips for the Stargate project, people familiar with the matter said.

OpenAI and its backer Microsoft ( MSFT ) are among the tech giants pouring billions into data centers to power generative AI services such as ChatGPT and Copilot.

AI's role in sensitive sectors such as defense and China's push to catch up have made the nascent technology a top priority for Trump. 

(Reporting by Nilutpal Timsina and Angela Christy in Bengaluru and Deepa Seetharaman in Abilene; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)