TechFlow news, March 14 — According to TechCrunch, SoftBank has confirmed its plan to acquire Sharp's Sakai factory in Osaka for $676 million (approximately 100 billion yen), intending to transform the former liquid crystal panel production facility into an artificial intelligence data center.
The data center marks a key step in SoftBank’s collaboration with OpenAI in Japan. The two companies have previously established a joint venture, SB OpenAI Japan, aiming to deploy an enterprise-grade AI service named "Cristal Intelligence" in the Japanese market.
According to Nikkei, OpenAI will use the factory’s graphics processing units to develop foundational models, training them on data from customer marketing and other activities, then sell customized AI agents to clients.
