The 60-second brief
- 1Crusoe has ended its plan to buy 29 Boom Supersonic Superpower turbines, an order announced in December 2025 that TechCrunch valued at $1.25 billion.
- 2Crusoe says it will still use turbines, plus wind, solar, batteries and the grid, choosing power site by site.
- 3Boom CEO Blake Scholl said Boom will deliver about 250 megawatts to other sites next year and targets 1 gigawatt in 2028.
- Value of cancelled turbine order
- $1.25 billion
- Turbines in the original order
- 29 units of 42 MW each
- Boom's planned 2027 deliveries to other sites
- About 250 MW
- Crusoe's recent fundraise (TechCrunch)
- $3.9 billion
- Crusoe's Microsoft campus in Abilene
- 900 MW, on-site gas turbines
Why CEOs should care
For companies buying AI capacity, the episode shows that power plans behind data centers are still fluid. Crusoe says its energy plans have not changed even as it drops Boom as a supplier, but customers should still confirm what any equipment switch means for their own timelines. Infrastructure and procurement leaders should ask providers what share of a site's power is contracted and installed, which equipment vendors are committed, and what happens to delivery dates if a supplier changes. Where a provider relies on new or unproven generation equipment, ask for a fallback plan.
For industrial suppliers entering the AI power market, the lesson is about launch customers. Boom built a new business line around one anchor order and a funding round tied to it; losing that customer shifts the burden to its pipeline. CFOs evaluating new energy or equipment vendors for their own sites should check order books for concentration, ask for delivery track records, and favor contracts with clear remedies for late or cancelled equipment.
Boards overseeing heavy AI spending should see this as a reminder that the power behind their compute deserves as much scrutiny as the chips. Crusoe's mix of grid, backup gas and on-site turbines across sites shows there is no single answer yet. Ask management how the company's own AI roadmap depends on providers' power assumptions, and how exposed it is if those assumptions change. Directors with climate commitments should also ask how on-site gas generation at AI campuses, such as Crusoe's Microsoft site in Abilene, fits the company's emissions reporting for the compute it buys.
Key takeaways
- Crusoe has ended its plan to buy 29 Boom Supersonic Superpower turbines, an order announced in December 2025 that TechCrunch valued at $1.25 billion.
- Crusoe says it will still use turbines, plus wind, solar, batteries and the grid, choosing power site by site.
- Boom CEO Blake Scholl said Boom will deliver about 250 megawatts to other sites next year and targets 1 gigawatt in 2028.
The news
Crusoe, the Denver-based AI data center developer, has walked away from a $1.25 billion plan to buy Boom Supersonic's natural gas turbines, TechCrunch reported on September 25, ending the Crusoe Boom turbines partnership that had made Crusoe the launch customer for Boom's power business.
Boom announced the order on December 9, 2025: Crusoe would buy 29 of Boom's Superpower turbines, 42-megawatt gas-fired units adapted from the engine Boom is developing for its Overture supersonic airliner, for a total of about 1.21 gigawatts. Deliveries were due to start in 2027. At the time, Boom said the order gave it a turbine backlog of more than $1.25 billion and that it had closed a $300 million funding round. Crusoe CEO Chase Lochmiller said then that the deal fit the company's energy-first approach to building AI infrastructure.
Boom CEO Blake Scholl disclosed the change on September 25 in a post on X, according to TechCrunch, saying the companies were no longer moving forward with the launch partnership. Scholl wrote that Boom will deliver about 250 megawatts of Superpower units to other sites next year and is targeting 1 gigawatt in 2028.
Crusoe spokesperson Andrew Schmitt told TechCrunch the company's energy plans had not changed and that it still intends to use turbines, just not Boom's. He said Crusoe chooses power for each site as needs evolve, including turbines, wind, solar, batteries and the grid, and that the partnership was not the right fit now.
TechCrunch reported that Crusoe recently raised $3.9 billion. Its first 1.2-gigawatt data center in Abilene, Texas, built for Oracle and OpenAI, runs on grid power with a gas-turbine plant for backup, the company says, while a 900-megawatt Abilene campus it is building for Microsoft will use on-site gas turbines.
The numbers
- Value of cancelled turbine order
- $1.25 billion
- Turbines in the original order
- 29 units of 42 MW each
- Boom's planned 2027 deliveries to other sites
- About 250 MW
- Crusoe's recent fundraise (TechCrunch)
- $3.9 billion
- Crusoe's Microsoft campus in Abilene
- 900 MW, on-site gas turbines
Why CEOs should care
For companies buying AI capacity, the episode shows that power plans behind data centers are still fluid. Crusoe says its energy plans have not changed even as it drops Boom as a supplier, but customers should still confirm what any equipment switch means for their own timelines. Infrastructure and procurement leaders should ask providers what share of a site's power is contracted and installed, which equipment vendors are committed, and what happens to delivery dates if a supplier changes. Where a provider relies on new or unproven generation equipment, ask for a fallback plan.
For industrial suppliers entering the AI power market, the lesson is about launch customers. Boom built a new business line around one anchor order and a funding round tied to it; losing that customer shifts the burden to its pipeline. CFOs evaluating new energy or equipment vendors for their own sites should check order books for concentration, ask for delivery track records, and favor contracts with clear remedies for late or cancelled equipment.
Boards overseeing heavy AI spending should see this as a reminder that the power behind their compute deserves as much scrutiny as the chips. Crusoe's mix of grid, backup gas and on-site turbines across sites shows there is no single answer yet. Ask management how the company's own AI roadmap depends on providers' power assumptions, and how exposed it is if those assumptions change. Directors with climate commitments should also ask how on-site gas generation at AI campuses, such as Crusoe's Microsoft site in Abilene, fits the company's emissions reporting for the compute it buys.
The bigger picture
Some AI data center builders are adding on-site generation to their power mix: Crusoe's Microsoft campus in Abilene will run on on-site gas turbines, and Lochmiller said in December 2025 that Crusoe was looking for ways to speed up time-to-power across its energy assets. That has drawn new entrants such as Boom, an aerospace startup, into the turbine market. Deals like this one show the market sorting itself out: builders are keeping options open across gas, renewables, batteries and grid supply, and new equipment makers will need proven delivery before they can count on the largest customers. For Boom, the stakes extend beyond power: it said in December 2025 that ongoing revenue from the turbine business would help finance certification and delivery of its Overture airliner, so replacing its anchor customer matters to both programs.
What's next
Watch for Boom to name new Superpower customers and confirm its 2027 delivery target, and for Crusoe to disclose which turbine suppliers it is using at new campuses. Any shift in timelines at the Abilene sites serving OpenAI, Oracle and Microsoft would matter to the companies that depend on that capacity.
Sources
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