AIBRIEF
Meta and BlackRock launch a 1 gigawatt El Paso data center joint venture; about $12.5B of BlackRock's investment is debt financed, and operations are slated for 2028.
BlackRock-managed funds will own 80% of a roughly $14 billion El Paso data center joint venture announced Tuesday, with Meta retaining 20% and contributing the land and in-progress construction it already owns.
The campus is designed for 1 gigawatt of compute capacity — roughly a fifth of Meta's planned 5-gigawatt Louisiana expansion — and is targeted to begin operations in 2028, per the joint Meta/BlackRock release. About $12.5 billion of BlackRock's investment will be financed through debt. Meta's land and in-progress construction are valued at roughly $2.3 billion, paired with a $1 billion distribution that aligns the 80/20 split; BlackRock's cash contribution is about $4.9 billion. Morgan Stanley and J.P. Morgan Securities advised Meta.
The deal restructures a project Meta previously said would cost more than $10 billion. El Paso is one of 28 U.S. data centers Meta has operating or under construction, part of a stated $600 billion data center buildout by 2028 to support AI products.
Meta shares are down roughly 10% year-to-date as investors scrutinize AI expansion costs. Second-quarter results are due July 29.