Anthropic signs first Australian data center lease at A$32 billion Queensland campus, pending FIRB approval

What happened

Bloomberg reports that the AI company plans to invest in Australian data centers (a building full of computers that runs online services) to expand its capacity. The first concrete step is a lease at the proposed Western Downs Digital Park in Queensland.

It was confirmed in the state parliament on September 16, 2026, and it is a sizable commitment. What Anthropic actually signed Anthropic, the company behind the Claude large language model (the kind of AI system trained on text to produce text), has signed its first data center lease in the country. Anthropic is an artificial intelligence company based in San Francisco, and its products and services include Claude and Claude Code.

12, 2026 Anthropic is putting down roots in Australia. The site sits near the towns of Dalby and Kogan in Queensland’s Western Downs region.

The lease covers the campus’s initial phase. The broader project is led by Zerra DC , a Singapore-based developer.

Its partners are Australian Data Centres, which is controlled by Dexus, and Macquarie Capital. That capacity would be spread across four buildings, each rated at 360 MW, on a 725-hectare site.

Key facts

• Bloomberg — reports: that the AI company plans to invest in Australian data centers to expand its capacity