Financial Times · Palantir · Google · Fortune Technology
Peter Thiel is leading investment in an ocean data center powered by waves—and the startup is reportedly worth $1 billion
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As hyperscalers like Alphabet look to the skies as the next frontier of data centers, Peter Thiel is looking to the seas.
Key facts
- In 2008, Thiel donated $500,000 to The Seasteading Institute, an organization founded by a former Google engineer and Sun Microsystems programmer to spearhead these utopian-adjacent sea communities
- The company spent years designing Ocean-1 and Ocean-2 prototypes, beginning in 2021, and plans to deploy its most recent Ocean-3 system in the northern Pacific Ocean this year, with commercial
- The funding pushes Panthalassa’s valuation close to $1 billion, the Financial Times reported, citing a person familiar with the terms of the deal
- Panthalassa, a U.S.-based start up betting on ocean waves to power a fleet of floating data centers, announced $140 million in funding earlier this month led by Thiel
Summary
Panthalassa, a U.S.-based start up betting on ocean waves to power a fleet of floating data centers, announced $140 million in funding earlier this month led by Thiel. The funding pushes Panthalassa’s valuation close to $1 billion, the Financial Times reported, citing a person familiar with the terms of the deal. “The future demands more compute than we can imagine,” Thiel said announcing the funding. Surging AI demand in the U.S. has hit snags with an aging and beleaguered grid system vulnerable to extreme weather.