A transatlantic investment consortium on April 28 announced plans to build a €50bn artificial intelligence (AI)-focused data centre and innovation campus in Croatia, in what it described as the largest investment in the country’s history and one of the biggest private US investments in Europe.

Pantheon Atlas LLC said the project, branded Pantheon AI, would be located in Topusko, about 45 minutes from the capital Zagreb, and aims to position Croatia as a regional hub for digital infrastructure amid surging demand for AI computing capacity.

The announcement was made at the Three Seas Initiative Summit in Dubrovnik. The campus will be designed in line with NVIDIA’s gigawatt-scale AI factory standards and is expected to reach 1 gigawatt (GW) of total capacity, with 800 megawatts (MW) of usable IT load, the company said.

“Pantheon AI is a signal to the world that Croatia is open for the highest-caliber investment,” said Jako Andabak, founding partner at PantheonAI. “This project is the culmination of years of work to bring world-class digital infrastructure to Croatia, and we have assembled the deep local expertise, grid relationships, and regulatory groundwork required to meet demand for data centre capacity.”

The project was announced at a time when Europe faces a shortage of data centre capacity driven by the rapid growth of artificial intelligence, with vacancy rates in established hubs falling below 8% and grid connection delays slowing expansion.

Pantheon Atlas said its development would address what it called a “structural capacity gap” in Europe by combining US capital with local expertise and pre-secured access to power and grid infrastructure in Croatia.

“We have assembled a transatlantic partnership to solve one of the most pressing challenges in global digital infrastructure: enabling hyperscale operators to meet AI-driven demand at scale,” said Ryan Rich, managing partner of PantheonAI. 

“We have lined up the power, fibre, regulatory stability, and institutional support to solve that problem in Europe, and we will establish Croatia and Central Europe as a premier destination for world-class digital infrastructure.”

Central and Eastern Europe is expected to see data centre electricity demand grow three- to four-fold by 2035, yet currently lacks a gigawatt-scale, AI-optimised facility, the company said.

At the same time, European Union data sovereignty rules are pushing major technology companies to store data within the bloc, increasing the need for domestic infrastructure.

The Pantheon AI campus will include four independent fibre routes across three major EU corridors, with a subsea cable link expected to extend connectivity to Milan by 2028.

The developers said the project would be fully powered by renewable energy, including a planned on-site 500 MW solar plant and 8,000 megawatt-hours of battery storage. It is also expected to enable the integration of up to 5.2 GW of renewable energy into Croatia’s national grid through new transmission infrastructure.

Construction of the initial €12bn campus is due to begin in early 2027, with full operations targeted for the first quarter of 2029. Total investment is projected to exceed €50bn as tenants install equipment and scale up operations.

The project is expected to create around 1,500 permanent jobs and a further 3,000 roles during the construction phase.

US officials welcomed the initiative as a sign of deepening transatlantic cooperation in critical infrastructure.

“The race to lead in artificial intelligence is global, and we are pleased to see American capital and investment expertise like Pantheon AI anchoring that leadership in allied, democratic nations,” said Joshua Volz, special envoy for Global Energy Integration at the US Department of Energy. 

“Critical infrastructure of this scale, built by the private sector responding to real market demand, is exactly how US interests and European security advance together.”

The investment vehicle behind the project includes US institutional investors and high-net-worth individuals, while European renewable energy developer Greenvolt International Power, majority owned by global investment firm KKR, has signed a letter of intent to build the solar and battery systems.

Other partners include advisory firm Eastdil Secured, Croatian engineering companies Končar Group and Dalekovod Projekt, and Zagreb-based Parsec Lab, which is leading data centre design.

Legal and financial advisory services are being provided by Latham & Watkins, Hodgson Russ, PwC and KPMG.

Local authorities in Sisak-Moslavina County have formally recognised the project as being of special regional importance and signed a cooperation agreement to support its development.

Pantheon Atlas said the campus would be built on a 310-acre site, expandable to 450 acres, and designed to minimise disruption to surrounding communities while delivering resilience levels above Tier IV, the highest standard for data centre availability.

The company did not disclose potential tenants but said the facility is intended for hyperscale technology operators seeking large-scale AI infrastructure within EU and NATO territory.