Nscale investor Aker calls Microsoft exit a 'minor contract'

Why Microsoft walked away

Microsoft cancelled its agreement to lease computing capacity from Nscale after it emerged that the company's Essex data centre, the UK's largest AI facility, was unlikely to have a power supply until after 2030. The site was part of Microsoft's £22bn investment in the UK. The cancellation was a blow to Nscale just ahead of its planned New York listing, where it is targeting a $35bn valuation.

Aker's stake is valued at about $3.31bn, based on the March Series C valuation of $14.6bn, when Aker invested around $350m.

A sector under scrutiny

The comments come as investors question whether so-called neoclouds such as Nscale, Nebius and CoreWeave are financially sound. These firms run chip-packed data centres and lease capacity to AI developers including Anthropic, OpenAI and Meta. Gartner analysts predict that by 2030, 80 per cent of neocloud firms will "cease independent operations".

Eriksen acknowledged the pressure, saying new winners and losers are about to be defined as innovation, investment and adoption keep growing. "History tells that the best performance, the best execution, will win," he said.

Nscale is reported to be close to a new multibillion-dollar deal with Anthropic that would double the AI developer's commitment to buy computing power from Nscale's major data centre in West Virginia. Such a contract would help offset the lost Microsoft business as the IPO approaches.