Introducing OpenAI for Australia

Today, we’re launching OpenAI for Australia, a nationwide initiative bringing OpenAI together with local partners to unlock the full economic and societal benefits of artificial intelligence across the country.

AI is a foundational technology with the potential to support growth, lift productivity, and fuel innovation. To help realize this vision, OpenAI will work with local partners through OpenAI for Australia—the first OpenAI for Countries program in the Asia Pacific region—to support sovereign AI infrastructure, upskill Australians, and accelerate Australia’s thriving local AI ecosystem.

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, said, “Australia is well placed to be a global leader in AI, with deep technical talent, strong institutions and a clear ambition to use new technology to lift productivity. Through OpenAI for Australia, we are focused on accelerating the infrastructure, workforce skills and local ecosystem needed to turn that opportunity into long-term economic growth.”

Building the next generation of sovereign AI infrastructure in Australia

OpenAI today signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with NEXTDC to develop a sovereign AI infrastructure partnership under the OpenAI for Australia program.

Through the MoU, OpenAI and NEXTDC will collaborate on the planning, development and operation of a next-generation hyperscale AI campus and large-scale GPU supercluster at NEXTDC’s S7 site in Eastern Creek, Sydney.

OpenAI intends to be an initial offtaker with the option to scale over time under the OpenAI for Countries program. This would provide Australia with the sovereign compute capacity needed to support sensitive and mission-critical workloads across government, enterprise, research and national infrastructure.

Upskilling Australians alongside CommBank, Coles, and Wesfarmers

OpenAI’s in-house team of AI experts will work closely with these organisations to develop bespoke learning modules tailored to real-world Australian use cases.