Bloomberg Tech

Chase Lochmiller on why building AI starts with the electron, not the chip

Chase Lochmiller· Co-founder and CEO at Crusoe
·~9 min·English·Bloomberg
AI InfrastructureBusiness StrategyAI Company
TL;DR

Crusoe's CEO argues that building AI is as much a physical job as a software one, so his company runs the whole chain from generating power to serving a model's output, and now has to win the local politics of building data centers before the backlash sets in.

01The Business Model

From the Electron to the Token

Crusoe is not just a data-center builder; it manages the whole chain from generating power to serving a model's output, a stack Lochmiller calls the electron to the token.

Crusoe is a vertically integrated AI infrastructure platform that, you know, helps manage infrastructure from the electron to the token.

— Chase Lochmiller, Bloomberg Tech
Key Insight
Framing the stack as electron to token quietly relocates where AI is won. If the binding constraint is power and land rather than chips, then the company that controls energy, not just servers, would set the ceiling on how much intelligence the industry can produce.
02The Business Model

Three Products, Three Clocks

Crusoe sells the same infrastructure on three very different contracts, and each one is tied to how long the asset underneath it lasts: decades-long data-center leases, multi-year GPU clusters, and on-demand inference.

we're typically working with very large tech companies that have investment grade credit ratings, and they're typically committing to us, you know, for somewhere between fifteen and twenty years.

— Chase Lochmiller, Bloomberg Tech
Key Insight
Each line of business carries a different renewal risk: multi-decade data-center leases give the longest visibility, GPU contracts are capped by how fast chips age out, and managed services rise and fall as customers scale their own AI applications.
03Growth and Capital

The Board Adds Energy, Data-Center, and Public-Company Muscle

Crusoe added three heavyweight directors: JB Straubel for energy, Bill Stein for data centers, and Cloudflare's longtime CFO Thomas Seifert as audit chair. Lochmiller says the public markets remain something Crusoe is always considering.

as we think about the public markets, you know, look, it's something we're always, you know, considering, you know, what the best ways are to capitalize Crusoe's growth.

— Chase Lochmiller, Bloomberg Tech
Key Insight
A board is a public signal before an S-1 is. Adding a Tesla energy leader, a data-center veteran, and a public-company CFO as audit chair points to a company building for energy scale, physical scale, and the reporting rigor of the public markets, even as Lochmiller frames an actual IPO as still only under consideration.
04Politics and Perception

The Backlash Is a Marketing Issue

With data centers now a live issue in midterm races and a Texas moratorium in play, Lochmiller casts the opposition largely as a communication problem, inaccurate information more than a real objection, and notes that no Crusoe project has yet been delayed or paused.

we are seeing a lot of information that's just, you know, frankly not accurate.

— Chase Lochmiller, Bloomberg Tech
Key Insight
Calling a legitimacy problem a marketing issue locates the fix in Crusoe's hands, better communication, rather than in the substance of local concerns about power and land. Which side is not accurate, the narrative or the worry, is exactly what the coming elections will test.
05Politics and Perception

Crusoe's Answer to the Water Fear: a Closed Loop

One common worry is that data centers drain local water. Lochmiller's answer: his big Abilene buildings use roughly the water of ten homes, because the chips are cooled on a sealed loop.

the water to cool the chips, that's actually operating on a closed loop system.

— Chase Lochmiller, Bloomberg Tech
Key Insight
Water is the most concrete fear to answer, and the one Crusoe leans on. A sealed loop genuinely cuts water use, but it does so by moving the heat into the air with power-hungry chillers, so the question the loop leaves open is the electricity and grid load, not the water.
06Politics and Perception

The Local Math: Tax Base and Schools

Lochmiller's case to wary communities is fiscal: in Abilene, Crusoe expects to be about a third of the county tax base and more than double the school system's receipts, and in Armstrong County to lift tax revenue by over 100 percent.

these can be transformative for these communities. And from a tax revenue perspective, you know, they can also be transformative as well.

— Chase Lochmiller, Bloomberg Tech
Key Insight
This is the old factory playbook applied to compute: win local consent by becoming the tax base that funds schools, police, and roads. It is also why the timing is urgent, because the fiscal upside only lands if the projects get built before moratoria and ballot-box opposition harden.