NAVER's $9 Billion AI Factory Is Built on a Fee Contract Banks Can Lend Against - Global Data Center Hub
Naver has secured a $9 billion financing deal for a massive AI factory with Brookfield and Nvidia, marking a new model for financing high-performance computing infrastructure.
The deal creates a unique structure where a Brookfield-funded company will own the GPUs and the buildings, while NAVER Cloud will run them and pay a fee to use them. This arrangement allows NAVER to build toward 200 MW without paying for the hardware up front, while Brookfield gets an asset with a named payer and a parent company behind that payer.
Nvidia's $1 billion payment, completed on November 6, was the final step in a sequence that began with a condition. Nvidia would invest only after NAVER secured at least $9 billion of separate committed financing for computing infrastructure.
The financing is a syndicated loan of KRW 12.6 trillion, with KB Kookmin Bank mandating about KRW 10.7 trillion. Hana Bank, Shinhan Bank, Woori Bank, and NH Investment & Securities are reported as participants.
Credit structure
The headline reads as an equity story, but underneath it sits a credit structure. Brookfield will form a special purpose company, tentatively named Asset Co., to buy GPUs and data center assets. A Brookfield investment vehicle will fund 100% of its capital.
Asset Co. supplies computing to NAVER Cloud, which operates the AI factory and sells services to customers. NAVER Cloud pays usage fees, and NAVER says those fees are tied to business revenue, which it claims eases financial pressure in the early stage.
Project loans usually rest on real estate or power plants. KB Kookmin describes the deal as Korea's first GPU financing and its largest syndicated loan arrangement. The Korea Herald notes that lenders focus on the long-term service fees and NAVER Cloud's ability to pay them.
Lenders focus on the long-term service fees and NAVER Cloud’s ability to pay them. And GPU resale value is hard to predict.
Capacity and timeline
The capacity plan is staged at the GAK Sejong data center: 55 MW in the first half of 2027, 100 MW by the end of 2027, and 200 MW in 2028. NAVER describes the wider project as a 1-gigawatt-scale global AI factory.
Nvidia brings two things to the table: the platform, the DSX AI factory stack with Blackwell and Vera Rubin systems, and $1 billion of new equity at the parent. The July terms had pointed to 4.5% and 7,241,564 shares at KRW 204,500 each.
On November 1, KB Kookmin Bank announced the mandate to arrange the loans. The Korea Times reports that repayment relies on expected long-term revenue from selling AI computing capacity. Final commitments have not been disclosed.
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