ZanKore
A four-party consortium of Ooredoo Group, Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison, NVIDIA, and Nokia is building Southeast Asia’s largest AI factory platform — a sovereign-AI infrastructure bet launched out of Indonesia
ZanKore — formally branded Zankore by Indosat — launched on August 6, 2026 in Jakarta as a Southeast Asian AI infrastructure joint venture. We frame this not as a conventional venture-backed startup case, but as a strategic carve-out / joint-venture structure built on telecom infrastructure assets. There is no individual founder narrative here; the entity’s basis for existence is the combined capital and technology of four blue-chip sponsors — Ooredoo Group (Qatari telecom group), Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison (Indonesia’s second-largest mobile operator, “IOH”), NVIDIA, and Nokia. In our assessment, this consortium structure carries structurally lower execution risk than a pure-play startup, given the balance-sheet backing and operational track record each sponsor brings.
On governance, Ooredoo Group holds a 49% stake as founding shareholder and lead investor, with IOH understood to hold the remaining equity and to provide local execution capability. We flag, however, that the precise allocation of residual equity, and whether NVIDIA or Nokia hold any equity participation, is not explicitly disclosed in public materials — we treat this as a data gap. As of the launch announcement, both technology partners are named without board representation, consistent with a technology/commercial-partner role rather than an equity stake.
Spent roughly three decades at Ericsson, serving as Group CTO and Chief Strategy & Technology Officer (2012–2018), followed by a role as SVP of Technology Transformation at T-Mobile US leading its 5G build-out. His background is deep in large-scale telecom network deployment; we flag that this appears to be his first executive role specifically operating AI data-center infrastructure, which we treat as a relevant execution risk.
Aziz Aluthman Fakhroo and Thomas Chevanne (representing Ooredoo Group); Vikram Sinha and Vishal Gupta (representing IOH — Sinha concurrently serves as IOH President Director & CEO); and Arijit Ranjan Sarker as Independent Director. In our view, this reflects a fairly conventional telecom-JV governance balance between the lead investor and the local execution partner.
The advisory structure on this transaction is also worth noting: Citi acted as the exclusive financial advisor to Indosat, while FTI Capital Advisors advised Ooredoo Group. IOH itself was formed via the roughly $6 billion 2022 merger of Indosat Ooredoo and Hutchison Asia Telecom Group, and Ooredoo has a long history in the market — it acquired a 65% stake in Indosat for $1.8 billion back in 2008 — which we view as relevant context for assessing the sponsor’s regional commitment and staying power.
ZanKore’s business model is best summarized as a “full-stack AI Factory.” Rather than leasing conventional colocation space, the platform is built on NVIDIA’s DSX reference architecture, integrating compute, networking, power, cooling, and operations into a single system designed to maximize useful AI output per megawatt. We view this integrated design as carrying a structural cost and power-efficiency advantage relative to operators that procure these layers separately from multiple vendors.
| Stage | Milestone | Timing | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stage 0 | Indosat–NVIDIA cloud partnership | ~2022 | Per Ooredoo Group CEO, IOH struck a deal to become NVIDIA’s first cloud partner in Indonesia — the relational foundation for this JV |
| Stage 0.5 | Surakarta AI center plan (“GPU Merdeka”) | 2024 | NVIDIA and IOH jointly planned a $200M AI center in Central Java (Surakarta); we view this as a precursor project to ZanKore |
| Stage 1 | ZanKore formally launched; $800M investment confirmed | Aug 6, 2026 | Four-party consortium announced in Jakarta. Ooredoo confirmed as lead investor with a 49% stake |
| Stage 2 | Initial 200MW capacity live | H1 2027 | First commercial deployment on GB300 NVL72. Company claims “blue-chip customers” already secured for this capacity — client identities undisclosed and unverifiable |
| Stage 3 | 1GW long-term buildout and regional expansion | ~3-year target | Plan to expand from Indonesia across Southeast Asia; specific country, site, and financing plans undisclosed |
Completeness of the AI stack: ZanKore positions itself as more than compute infrastructure, pairing capacity with Indonesian-language LLM models under the Sahabat-AI brand, intelligent network capabilities via AI Grid, and Nokia’s AI-RAN technology. IOH CEO Vikram Sinha framed this as addressing the shift from AI experimentation to mission-critical deployment, where enterprises need “an integrated AI ecosystem” rather than raw compute alone. In our read, this bundled positioning could be a genuine differentiator versus pure colocation competitors, but we flag that the market has not yet demonstrated willingness to pay a premium for this integration.
ZanKore’s capital history is not a conventional VC funding sequence — it is the product of a parent-company (Ooredoo Group) strategic capital-allocation decision. We believe the more appropriate analytical frame is telecom infrastructure carve-out and reinvestment rather than startup fundraising. In that context, IOH’s recent spin-off of its fiber infrastructure business (PT Infra Fiber Teknologi, in partnership with Arsari Group) reads to us as part of the same capital-recycling pattern that produced ZanKore.
Ooredoo Group CEO Fakhroo noted the group “started this journey two years ago through IOH… when we struck a deal with Nvidia to become its first cloud partner in Indonesia.” This suggests the JV is the culmination of a multi-year relationship rather than an opportunistic entry.
Per Indonesia’s communications ministry, NVIDIA and IOH planned an AI center in Surakarta, Central Java, in 2024, coinciding with the “GPU Merdeka” branded H100 cluster offering entering the market.
About a month before the ZanKore launch, IOH carved out its fiber infrastructure business into PT Infra Fiber Teknologi (IFT), an open-access wholesale fiber platform backed by Arsari Group. We read this as evidence of a repeatable IOH pattern: monetizing non-core infrastructure assets to redeploy capital into higher-growth priorities such as AI compute.
Indosat, Ooredoo Group, Nokia, and NVIDIA jointly announced the platform in Jakarta. Ooredoo Group confirmed as founding shareholder and lead investor with a 49% stake, committing approximately $800M over five years. Citi advised Indosat and FTI Capital Advisors advised Ooredoo Group on the transaction. The company indicated the initial investment is expected to generate roughly $600M in cumulative EBITDA attributable to Ooredoo over five years — a company-sourced estimate that we note has not been independently verified.
Data-quality note: ZanKore is a privately held joint venture; the revenue/EBITDA estimates and capital-allocation splits above are drawn from company and parent-company disclosures and have not undergone independent verification comparable to exchange or SEC-level filings. The claim of “blue-chip customers already secured” for the initial 200MW is similarly unverifiable, as no client names have been disclosed.
Indonesia’s AI/data center market is fragmented, with roughly 68 operators in the field. DCI Indonesia (83MW, Tier IV track record), Telkom Indonesia’s NeutraDC (42MW live, targeting 400MW by 2030, partnered with Microsoft Azure), and international hyperscale entrants such as Princeton Digital Group, EdgeConneX, and ST Telemedia GDC already carry meaningful operating track records. Against this backdrop, we see ZanKore’s structural differentiation across six dimensions.
Compute (NVIDIA), networking (Nokia), power, cooling, and operations unified under a single DSX reference architecture. We view this as a potential structural advantage in build speed and output-per-megawatt versus operators procuring these layers piecemeal.
Indonesia’s Minister of Communication and Digital Affairs publicly endorsed “sovereign AI infrastructure” at the launch. We would flag that government alignment can translate into meaningful real-world advantages on permitting, power allocation, and data-sovereignty compliance relative to standalone private operators.
Up to 40% additional compute within the same power envelope via NVIDIA DSX MaxLPS. In a region where grid capacity is a structural bottleneck, we read this technical edge as translating fairly directly into differentiated revenue capacity.
Ooredoo is a listed MENA telecom group with a multi-year record of building digital infrastructure — subsea cables, data centers, connectivity. We view this as structurally more durable financing than a typical startup cap table, and the five-year phased commitment as a risk-mitigating disbursement structure.
As Indonesia’s second-largest mobile operator, IOH brings existing site, power, and regulatory-navigation experience directly applicable to AI data-center buildout — a potential lead-time advantage over new foreign entrants unfamiliar with local processes.
Southeast Asian data-center demand is projected to grow roughly 3.5x by 2030. ZanKore positions itself as the first integrated consortium targeting 1GW in the region, with potential to serve as a platform for further regional expansion if the initial buildout executes on schedule.
Our view: ZanKore’s competitive edge derives from its four-party blue-chip consortium structure rather than from any single proprietary technology or founder capability. We would stress that while this diversifies execution risk, it also introduces a countervailing risk: coordination failure or misaligned incentives among four independent sponsors could slow decision-making relative to a single-owner operator.
ZanKore is a privately held joint venture with no commercial revenue as of its August 2026 launch. We note that public-market investors can currently only track this exposure indirectly, through the financial statements of Ooredoo Group (listed on the Qatar Stock Exchange, majority state-owned but independently managed). For reference, IOH reported record quarterly revenue of IDR 15.2 trillion (approximately $930M, assuming an IDR/USD rate of roughly 1,630 — subject to FX fluctuation) in Q1 2026, with management citing AI hyper-personalization as a growth driver.
On the opportunity side, we flag ▲ explicit Indonesian government support for “sovereign AI,” which we expect to translate into favorable permitting and power-allocation treatment; ▲ the structural tailwind of roughly 3.5x projected growth in Southeast Asian data-center demand by 2030; ▲ procurement and technology-risk mitigation via world-class partners in NVIDIA and Nokia; ▲ cross-sell potential across Ooredoo’s existing digital-infrastructure portfolio (subsea cables, data centers); and ▲ meaningful upside optionality if the platform scales beyond 1GW through regional expansion.
On the risk side, we flag ▲ coordination risk inherent to the four-party consortium structure, alongside incomplete public disclosure of equity and governance detail; ▲ the likelihood that the $800M commitment represents only an initial tranche of the total capital required to reach 1GW, implying substantial future capital raises (including debt) not yet disclosed; ▲ direct competition with established, track-record-bearing incumbents including DCI Indonesia, Telkom’s NeutraDC, Princeton Digital Group, NTT, and ST Telemedia; ▲ the unverified status of the “blue-chip customers secured” claim, with offtake terms undisclosed; ▲ limited AI data-center operating experience within the management team relative to its telecom-infrastructure background; ▲ potential delays in Indonesian grid connection and permitting timelines; and ▲ structural dependence on NVIDIA GPU supply and pricing.