MEMPHIS, Tenn. — xAI, the artificial intelligence company founded by Elon Musk, will build the world’s largest supercomputer in Memphis, Tennessee, officials announced Wednesday.
The multi-billion dollar “Gigafactory of Compute” will be the largest capital investment by a new-to-market company in Memphis history, Greater Memphis Chamber CEO Ted Townsend said.
It is expected to open sometime before the end of this calendar year, pending approval by local and state agencies.
xAI will occupy a former manufacturing facility in Memphis. Townsend did not identify the specific site at the company’s request, citing “global security concerns.”
The Greater Memphis Chamber said their team moved at “lightning speed” to ensure xAI would choose Memphis.
“I think it is a defining moment for Memphis to be recognized globally,” Townsend said. “We’re going to have some of the world’s top data scientists and computational engineers that are attracted here, that are working here.”
He described the scale of the proposed supercomputer like this: “If you take the two largest supercomputers in the world, and you combine them and you multiply them by four, that’s what we’re building here in Memphis.”
Memphis Light Gas & Water CEO Doug McGowen said the company would be able to provide xAI’s utility needs without putting local power and water systems at risk.
While the exact location was not disclosed, a press packet mentions the property’s owner, Phoenix Investments. A company with that name owns the former Electrolux manufacturing site on Paul R. Lowry Road in southwest Memphis. That facility closed in 2022.
Townsend said the deal must be approved by the city-county Economic Development Growth Engine Board, which typically grants tax incentives to companies. No incentive terms were disclosed Wednesday.
“The stage is set for Memphis to become the world leader in artificial intelligence and computing,” said state Rep. Raumesh Akbari (D-Memphis). “It’s really impossible to overstate the economic and technological impact of developing the largest supercomputer in the world — right here in Memphis. Grind City is on the verge of adding a new nickname: the Supercomputer City.”
xAI’s website states the company is “working on building artificial intelligence to accelerate human scientific discovery. We are guided by our mission to advance our collective understanding of the universe.”
The company was announced in July 2023, and a few days ago said it received $6 billion in a round of funding from investors.
Speculation on a potential project by Musk has been bubbling on social media this week after some claimed to have seen the tech billionaire in Memphis. The CEO of Tesla and SpaceX posted Sunday on the X platform, which he also owns, that he had french toast in Memphis.
So far Wednesday afternoon, Musk had not made any statement on X related to the project.
