xAI investing more than $20 billion in Southaven data center

• “This is insane execution speed by xAI and the state of Mississippi. We are grateful to Governor Reeves for his support of building xAI at warp speed,” Elon Musk said.

Governor Tate Reeves (R) joined xAI Thursday in Southaven to announce Mississippi’s largest corporate investment to date.

xAI, the artificial intelligence company founded by billionaire businessman Elon Musk, is locating a data center in Southaven to be known as MACROHARDRR.

The project represents a corporate investment exceeding $20 billion and will create hundreds of permanent jobs throughout DeSoto County.

Reeves said the “record-shattering $20 billion investment” is an amazing start to what is sure to be another incredible year for economic development in Mississippi.

“Today, Elon Musk is bringing xAI to DeSoto County, a project that will transform the region and bring amazing opportunities to its residents for generations,” Reeves said. “This is the largest economic development project in Mississippi’s history. It sets the pace for continued high-tech investments across our state and strengthens Mississippi’s position as a leader in this exciting tech revolution. There is truly no better time to invest in Mississippi.”

xAI has purchased and is retrofitting a building to house the new data center operations. It is in proximity to xAI’s newly acquired power plant site in Southaven and one of the company’s existing data centers in Tennessee.

Upon completion, the Southaven data center will increase the company’s computing power to nearly 2 gigawatts.

Musk, in a statement, said xAI is scaling at an immeasurable pace.

“We are building our third massive data center in the greater Memphis area. MACROHARDRR pushes our Colossus training compute to ~2GW – by far the most powerful AI system on Earth,” Musk said. “This is insane execution speed by xAI and the state of Mississippi. We are grateful to Governor Reeves for his support of building xAI at warp speed.”

xAI says the Southaven facility will be home to the world’s largest computer, “powered by Mississippi.”

In addition to building rehabilitation, Governor Reeves and local officials noted that xAI’s substantial investment will also provide tax revenue to support public safety, health and human services, education, fire fighters, police, parks and other initiatives that benefit the City of Southaven.

The Mississippi Development Authority noted that it has approved xAI for its Data Center Incentive, which provides a sales and use tax exemption for all computing and equipment software used by companies certified as data centers by the agency. The City of Southaven and DeSoto County are also supporting xAI’s projects through fee-in-lieu agreements.