NVIDIA-backed Nscale considers delaying $35 billion listing

According to TechFlow, on November 11, citing the UK's The Telegraph, British AI data center company Nscale is considering delaying its $35 billion (about £26 billion) listing plan to next year. Last week, global tech stocks suffered a sell-off, wiping $3 trillion off the U.S. stock market, amid market concerns that a Democratic 'blue wave' after U.S. midterm elections would slow data center construction and cause valuations of heavily indebted AI companies to decline collectively.

Nscale had originally planned to list in New York 'soon.' Under U.S. stock market rules, if it does not release a new quarterly earnings report in the coming days, the company has only a few days left to launch trading; people familiar with the matter said no decision has yet been made, and the company is expected to publish its third-quarter earnings soon. Nscale filed its New York Stock Exchange listing application in September this year, seeking a valuation of up to $35 billion at the time, but some investors believe that under current market conditions it may be less than half that figure; an earlier funding round this year valued it at $14.6 billion.

The listing plan had already suffered repeated setbacks: Microsoft last month withdrew from a deal to lease space at its flagship data center in Loughton, Essex, and turned down space at some of the company's other facilities; grid connection delays could push the UK site into the next decade. Nscale's investors include NVIDIA (which was expected to invest another $1 billion this month), and its board includes former UK Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, who is expected to gain up to $40 million from the listing, while CEO Josh Payne may receive $350 million. The company has contracts worth more than $100 billion with customers including Microsoft and Anthropic, but they rely heavily on new data centers being built; the company declined to comment.

Source: TechFlow