| Key Points: – Apollo Global Management in talks to lead $35 billion financing package for Meta’s US data centers – Funding will support Meta’s planned $65 billion AI investment strategy announced by Zuckerberg – Deal represents growing private credit market for AI infrastructure as tech giants race to build capacity |
Meta Platforms is pursuing a groundbreaking $35 billion financing package led by Apollo Global Management to accelerate the development of artificial intelligence data centers across the United States, according to sources familiar with the negotiations.
The Facebook parent company is engaging with the alternative asset manager to secure this substantial funding as part of its previously announced $65 billion investment in AI infrastructure planned for 2025. While discussions remain in early stages with no guarantee of completion, the deal represents one of the largest private financing arrangements for technology infrastructure to date.
“The race to build AI infrastructure is creating unprecedented investment opportunities,” said a market analyst who requested anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the ongoing negotiations. “Tech giants are competing for computing power, and Meta is positioning itself to avoid falling behind competitors like Microsoft.”
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg outlined the company’s aggressive AI strategy last month, emphasizing plans to construct massive new data centers and expand AI-focused teams. A key component of this vision includes bringing approximately one gigawatt of computing power online in 2025 – enough electricity to power roughly 750,000 homes.
The company has already announced a $10 billion data center in Louisiana and has been actively purchasing advanced computer chips to power its growing suite of AI products and services. This financing arrangement would provide Meta with the capital flexibility to accelerate these initiatives without compromising its balance sheet strength.
For Apollo, the deal aligns with its recent strategy of providing large-scale financing to investment-grade corporations while typically retaining a portion of the funding and syndicating the remainder to other investors. The firm has been expanding its capacity to write substantial checks as it pushes deeper into what it considers the next frontier of private credit markets.
The AI infrastructure boom is creating enormous demand for capital across the technology sector. Industry experts estimate hundreds of billions of dollars will be required to build the necessary data centers, power facilities, and networking infrastructure to support the computing demands of advanced AI systems.
Microsoft, one of Meta’s primary competitors in the AI space, recently announced plans to spend $80 billion on data centers in the current fiscal year. CEO Satya Nadella emphasized that sustaining this level of investment is essential to meet “exponentially more demand” for AI services.
Bankers and investors have been eager to participate in AI-related financing deals after witnessing stock markets heavily reward companies central to the AI ecosystem throughout the past year. Private credit providers like Apollo are increasingly stepping in to fill funding gaps as traditional banks face regulatory constraints on large-scale lending.
Neither Meta nor Apollo provided official comments regarding the potential financing arrangement, maintaining standard practice for deals at this preliminary stage. However, industry observers note that securing this funding would represent a significant strategic advantage for Meta as it competes for AI dominance against tech rivals including Microsoft, Google, and Amazon.