OpenAI Hands Its Data Center and Compute Operation to a Former xAI Executive
Uday Ruddarraju, who ran infrastructure at Elon Musk’s xAI until July 2025, has taken over OpenAI's compute and infrastructure businesses. This news was reported by Bloomberg on October 14, 2026.
Sachin Katti, previously overseeing infrastructure and the $30B Georgia build, will leave the role within weeks but will stay on as an adviser.
Ruddarraju joined OpenAI in July 2025 and became the chief technology officer for compute this July. He worked on the Grok 3 training run across 100,000 GPUs at xAI. He expressed his appreciation for Sachin's work maintaining commercial partnerships and expected a smooth handover, emphasizing his increased focus on the commercial side.
When OpenAI confirmed the departure of its data center chief in August, they already had a new compute CTO in place—Ruddarraju.
Several exits have occurred, including Chris Malone and Peter Hoeschele, who left for Meta, along with two colleagues. Data Center Dynamics also mentions Keith Heyde and Shamez Hemani. Katti, who arrived from Intel last year, oversaw the $30B Georgia site and an 8-gigawatt project in Ohio with SB Energy and Nvidia.
Katti commented, "I’m proud of what we’ve built and have total confidence in Uday and the team." He expressed his enthusiasm for building something new.
Ruddarraju inherits mostly American infrastructure. OpenAI paused Stargate UK in April due to high British electricity prices and unresolved copyright issues. The UK government expressed disappointment with the decision, and reports suggest OpenAI never visited the site they announced.
OpenAI's only announced European site is a 230-megawatt data center in Norway, revealed in July 2025. Most of the $856B compute bill will be spent in the United States.