OpenAI on Thursday said it is launching a Stargate-branded AI data center in Norway, marking its first foray into Europe with such a project.

British firm Nscale will design and build the site as part of a 50-50 joint venture with Norwegian energy infrastructure firm Aker.

OpenAI will be a so-called “off-taker” in the project, meaning it will effectively buy capacity from the data center.

“Part of the purpose of this project is to partner with OpenAI and leverage European sovereign compute to release additional services and features to the European continent,” Josh Payne, CEO of Nscale, told CNBC in an interview on Thursday.

The site aims to deliver 100,000 NVIDIA graphics processing units (GPU) by the end of 2026, “with the intention to expand significantly in the years ahead,” OpenAI said in a press release. The companies said the data center will run entirely on renewable power and have 230 megawatts of capacity, making it one of the biggest in Europe.

Nvidia’s GPUs have become the de facto choice of chips for data centers because of their ability to handle large AI workloads.

For the Norway project, Nscale and Aker have each committed around $1 billion to the initial 20MW phase of the project. The site will be located in Kvandal, just outside Narvik in northern Norway. The companies said the region is characterized by “abundant hydropower, low local electricity demand, and limited transmission capacity.”

Payne declined to comment on how Nscale would fund this project or the financial benefits of the project to the company. The CEO said there were no plans for additional Stargate data centers but that Nscale has its own “robust European expansion plan.”

Stargate was initially launched this year in the U.S. as an infrastructure project between OpenAI, Oracle, Japan’s SoftBank, and the UAE’s MGX. The project aims to invest $500 billion over the next four years, building out AI infrastructure.

OpenAI has looked to take this initiative globally. In June, the company and its partners announced plans to build a Stargate campus in the UAE.

Europe has meanwhile been pushing the concept of “sovereign AI,” requiring data centers and AI workloads to be located and processed on European soil.

Payne said Europe has two “problems” — the first is that it does not have enough computing capacity, and the second it is “very fragmented.”

“What the continent needs is large AI infrastructure projects deploying compute [power]. The ecosystem can consume from the project to build AI products, to generate productivity growth and economic benefit,” Payne said.

Companies like Nvidia and OpenAI have also been touting their ability to deliver sovereign AI as they look to expand their businesses.

In a trip to Europe this year, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang urged the continent to build more AI infrastructure. French AI company Mistral announced plans to use Nvidia’s GPUs in a new data center planned for France.

Britain’s Shell on Thursday reported better-than-expected second-quarter profit and maintained the pace of its shareholder returns, despite the impact of lower global oil and gas prices.

The energy giant posted adjusted earnings of $4.26 billion for the three months through June, beating analyst expectations of $3.87 billion, according to an LSEG-compiled consensus.

A separate, company-provided analyst forecast had expected Shell’s second-quarter profit to come in at $3.74 billion.

Shell reported adjusted earnings of $6.29 billion over the same period last year and $5.58 billion in the first three months of 2025.

The results come shortly after the London-listed firm flagged weaker trading results at its integrated gas division and losses at its chemicals and products arm.

Shell also announced another $3.5 billion in share buybacks over the next three months, keeping the pace of its shareholder returns. It marks the 15th consecutive quarter of at least $3 billion in buybacks.

“The backdrop of the macro has been challenging, and what I would say is we continue on the momentum that we have in transforming Shell,” CEO Wael Sawan told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Thursday.

“On all measures, [I’m] pleased with that performance. And on the trading side, indeed, despite difficult macro, pleased with how the team has performed,” Sawan said.

Shares of Shell were up 2.5% at around 9 a.m. London time (4 a.m. ET).

In March, Shell announced plans to prioritize shareholder returns, ramp up the cost of savings and double down on its liquified natural gas (LNG) push. The strategic update was designed to bolster its commitment to value creation, while maintaining focus on “performance, discipline and simplification.”

The plan appears to have been well received by investors. Shell’s share price has outperformed many of its European and U.S. rivals so far this year, notching gains of 8%. By comparison, Britain’s BP is up 3%, France’s TotalEnergies is down 2% and Exxon Mobil is up 4% over the same period.

Notably, Shell recently dismissed speculation about a possible takeover bid for BP, saying in late June that it had “no intention” of making an offer for its struggling domestic rival.

Asked about the prospect of acquisitions and whether the current state of play means bigger is better for oil companies, Sawan replied: “I don’t buy bigger is better. I think you have to drive it from a value perspective.”

Shell’s CEO said scale is not of concern for the world’s largest trader of liquified natural gas (LNG).

“It is how do we leverage that scale by focusing on the areas where we have competitive strengths and the areas where can create value,” he addd.

Shell’s Sawan repeated his comments from earlier in the year when asked about the prospect of the company moving its listing from London to New York, saying it is not a live discussion.

“Part of the reason is actually we have been outperforming. We have been able to just stick to our own story, just deliver on what we say we’re going to do. At Capital Markets Day we used the old tag line: ‘You can be sure of Shell,'” Sawan said.

“On the back of that, we feel more and more confident that our message is getting through to those pools of capital that want to invest in this differentiated investment thesis that we have,” he added.