OpenAI on Monday said the U.S. needs to substantially ramp up its investment in new energy capacity if it wants to stay ahead of China in the race to develop artificial intelligence.

The startup has been inking deals for ambitious infrastructure buildouts in recent months that will require massive amounts of power. The sprawling data centers will push the boundaries of what is possible in the U.S. during a time when the electric grid is already under strain.

“Electricity is not simply a utility,” OpenAI said in a blog post Tuesday. “It’s a strategic asset that is critical to building the AI infrastructure that will secure our leadership on the most consequential technology since electricity itself.”

OpenAI shared an 11-page submission with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, in which it encouraged the U.S. to commit to building 100 gigawatts of new energy capacity each year.

A gigawatt is a measure of power, and 10 gigawatts is roughly equivalent to the annual power consumption of 8 million U.S. households, according to a CNBC analysis of data from the Energy Information Administration.

OpenAI said that China added 429 gigawatts of new power capacity last year, while the U.S. added 51 gigawatts. The company said this disparity is creating an “electron gap” that is putting the U.S. at risk of falling behind.

“Electrons are the new oil,” OpenAI said.

WATCH: OpenAI begins to threaten software stocks

Amazon is preparing to announce sweeping job cuts beginning Tuesday, CNBC has learned.

The layoffs will amount to the largest cuts to Amazon’s corporate workforce in the company’s history, spanning almost every business, according to a person familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named because the details are confidential.

Amazon is expected to begin informing employees of the layoffs via email Tuesday morning, the person said.

The company plans to lay off as many as 30,000 staffers across its corporate workforce, according to Reuters, which first reported the news.

Amazon declined to comment.

Amazon is the nation’s second-largest private employer, with more than 1.54 million staffers globally as of the end of the second quarter. That figure is primarily made up of its warehouse workforce. It has roughly 350,000 corporate employees.

The planned layoffs would also represent the biggest job cuts across the tech industry since at least 2020, according to Layoffs.fyi. As of Monday, more than 200 tech companies have laid off approximately 98,000 employees since the start of the year, according to the site, which monitors job cuts in the tech sector.

Microsoft has laid off about 15,000 people so far this year, while Meta last week eliminated roughly 600 jobs within its artificial intelligence unit. Google cut more than 100 design-related roles in its cloud unit earlier this month, and Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said in September the company laid off 4,000 customer support staffers, pointing to its increasing AI adoption as a catalyst behind the cuts. Intel‘s cuts this year totaled 22,000 jobs, the most of any listed by Layoffs.fyi.

The steepest year for job cuts in tech came in 2023, as the industry reckoned with soaring inflation and rising interest rates. Close to 1,200 tech companies slashed over 260,000 jobs, the site said.

Over the past year, companies across industries including tech, banking, auto and retail have also pointed to the rise of generative AI as a force that’s likely to or already changing size of their workforces.

Amazon has conducted rolling layoffs across the company since 2022, which has resulted in more than 27,000 employees being let go. Job reductions have continued this year, though at a smaller scale. Amazon’s cloud, stores, communications and devices divisions have been hit with layoffs in recent months.

The layoffs are part of a broader cost-cutting campaign by Amazon CEO Andy Jassy that began during the Covid-19 pandemic. Jassy has also moved to simplify Amazon’s corporate structure by having fewer managers in order to “remove layers and flatten organizations.”

Jassy said in June that Amazon’s workforce could shrink further as a result of the company embracing generative AI, telling staffers that the company “will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today, and more people doing other types of jobs.”

“It’s hard to know exactly where this nets out over time, but in the next few years, we expect that this will reduce our total corporate workforce,” Jassy said in the June memo to staff.

WATCH: Report: Amazon targets as many as 30,000 corporate job cuts beginning Tuesday

Shares of iRobot plunged more than 30% on Monday after the company warned its search for a buyer has hit a substantial roadblock and its financial condition remains dire.

The Roomba maker has been vying to sell itself since March, but last week, the only remaining potential buyer withdrew from the process following a “lengthy period of exclusive negotiations,” iRobot disclosed in a regulatory filing.

iRobot’s future has remained uncertain after Amazon abandoned its planned $1.7 billion acquisition of the company in January 2024, citing regulatory scrutiny.

Since then, iRobot has struggled to generate cash and pay off debts, and in March warned there’s “substantial doubt” about its ability to stay in business.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy called regulators’ efforts to block the deal a “sad story,” arguing it would’ve allowed iRobot to scale and compete against rapidly growing rivals, such as China-based Anker, Ecovacs and Roborock.

iRobot said Monday its last remaining bidder offered a price per share that was “significantly lower” than its stock price over recent months. Shares of iRobot are down more than 50% this year.

“We currently are not in advanced negotiations with any alternative counterparties to a potential sale or strategic transaction,” iRobot wrote in the filing. “As such, there remains no assurance that our review of strategic alternatives will result in any transaction or outcome.”

In July 2023, iRobot took a $200 million loan from the Carlyle Group to fund its operations as a stopgap until the Amazon deal closed. iRobot said in the filing that it extended the waiver period for certain financial obligations until Dec. 1, its sixth amendment to the credit agreement.

The filing warns that if lenders don’t provide additional funding or if it can’t secure other sources of capital in the near term, it “may be forced to significantly curtail or cease operations and would likely see bankruptcy protection.”