Fermi Inc. Lands a $6.5 Billion Lease and a New CEO — But the Hard Part Is Still Ahead
Fermi Inc. (NASDAQ: FRMI) has signed a $6.5 billion lease with AI cloud provider TensorWave for part of its data center and power complex in Amarillo, Texas. It is the company's most concrete commercial deal to date after months of leadership turmoil and a steep stock decline. The lease was reported August 10, just days before Fermi named Lee McIntire as its new chief executive on August 12, 2026, ending an interim period that began when the board fired co-founder and former CEO Toby Neugebauer for cause in late April. ABC7 Amarillo TechCrunch
McIntire, an independent board member who previously served as CEO of the engineering firm CH2M Hill, takes over a company whose short life as a public stock has been anything but calm. Fermi filed for its IPO — the process by which a company first sells shares to the public — in September 2025 and began trading in early October, debuting at a $15 billion valuation amid a surge of investor interest in AI infrastructure stocks. E&E News Texas Standard Reuters
The company, co-founded by former US Energy Secretary Rick Perry and Neugebauer, plans to build four large nuclear reactors in the Texas Panhandle to power AI data centers, at an estimated total cost of about $17 billion. The site was originally supposed to run on natural gas, with nuclear as the long-term plan. Fermi had said construction of what it called the world's largest data center would begin by the end of 2025. Bloomberg The Washington Post
The turbulence started on April 17, 2026, when Fermi's board created an Interim Office of the CEO that included Chief Operating Officer Jacobo Ortiz. Two days later, on April 19, the board appointed Jeffrey S. Stein as a new director. Then, across late April, Fermi said it terminated Neugebauer for cause — meaning the board found he had violated company policy or his employment agreement. Shares dropped nearly 20% on the news, and the stock had already fallen roughly 72% from its debut valuation before that selloff deepened. Perry, who sits on the board, was part of the group that removed the CEO. SEC Filing (April 17) SEC Filing (April 19) Bloomberg WSJ
The $6.5 billion TensorWave lease and the McIntire appointment arrive as Fermi tries to shift attention from governance drama to actual construction progress. The lease covers part of the Amarillo campus and gives Fermi a committed tenant in the AI infrastructure space. The central question for investors and industry watchers is whether a company that went from a $15 billion IPO valuation to an 80% drawdown — a drawdown being the peak-to-trough decline in a stock's value — cycled through two CEOs and an interim office, and is pursuing one of the most expensive energy-and-computing projects ever proposed in the US, can turn a signed lease and a new chief executive into real construction milestones and revenue.
The scale of the ambition is the core fact. Four large nuclear reactors, a gas-fired interim power plan, and a data-center campus of claimed record size, all in the Texas Panhandle, add up to a financing challenge and execution risk that few companies in AI infrastructure have taken on. The $6.5 billion TensorWave lease anchors the demand side — proof that a customer wants the capacity. The $17 billion nuclear cost estimate defines the supply side — the bill to actually build it. The gap between the two, and Fermi's ability to close it through equity (selling shares), debt (borrowing), and potentially federal loan support, will determine whether the Amarillo project moves from press release to concrete being poured.
In my view, Fermi now has a CEO with real infrastructure-construction experience, a major tenant lease, and a board that has shown it will act decisively on governance. It also carries the valuation damage and execution risk of a company whose public life has been defined more by disruption than by delivery.
