Rafay & Argentum AI strike software orchestration deal

Rafay and Argentum AI have partnered to provide software orchestration for Argentum's AI infrastructure operations, focusing on tailored compute environments for large AI operators.

Under the agreement, Argentum will use the Rafay platform to provision, configure and manage separate software environments for individual customers through a single control plane. The setup is intended to help Argentum serve hyperscalers, neocloud providers and enterprise buyers with distinct software requirements across a growing international footprint.

Argentum secures and deploys AI infrastructure with access to data centre sites ranging from 10MW to more than 100MW, with total power capacity of more than 3GW across the US, Europe and other markets. It also provides GPU supply, managed services and orchestration for customers seeking dedicated compute resources.

The partnership addresses a practical challenge as AI demand expands. Different customers often need different baseline software stacks, and managing those environments individually across multiple sites becomes more difficult as deployments grow.

Rafay's software will serve as the orchestration layer, allowing Argentum to keep customer environments separate while managing them centrally. The model is designed to reduce operational complexity while allowing each buyer to maintain its own setup.

Market Demand

The deal comes as spending on AI infrastructure continues to rise. IDC has forecast global AI infrastructure spending of $758 billion by 2029, while its Worldwide Quarterly Artificial Intelligence Infrastructure Tracker found that spending on AI compute and storage hardware rose 166 per cent year on year in the second quarter of 2025 to $82 billion.

Gartner has also projected worldwide end-user spending on AI-optimised infrastructure-as-a-service of $37.5 billion in 2026. Together, those figures reflect growing demand for GPU-backed cloud resources for both model training and inference.

For infrastructure suppliers, the challenge goes beyond securing hardware and power. They also need to offer software environments that can be deployed quickly and managed consistently for different types of customers, from large cloud operators to enterprises seeking dedicated capacity.

Argentum said each of its deployments is financed through a special purpose vehicle structure backed by Blackstone, J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs, giving customers a single counterparty and a unified service-level agreement.

Growth Plans

The agreement also supports Argentum's next stage of expansion. The company plans to build its own neocloud offering and expects to use the same software platform for that move rather than replace its underlying orchestration system later.

That approach could allow Argentum to broaden its role from infrastructure provider and intermediary to cloud service operator without a separate technology transition. In a market where speed of deployment is a key selling point, avoiding a platform change could reduce disruption as the business expands.

Haseeb Budhani, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Rafay Systems, said Rafay had already worked with organisations managing AI compute at large scale and that the Argentum deal extends that work further into the infrastructure layer.

"Rafay has built a strong track record helping organizations deploying AI compute at massive scale bring scalable cloud management to their GPU fleets," said Haseeb Budhani, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder, Rafay Systems.

"Argentum represents an important expansion of that capability portfolio, as they operate at a foundational layer in the stack, connecting data center capacity and power to the largest AI operators in the world. They require the same kind of multi-tenant, configurable software orchestration that we have already perfected for cloud builders, so this partnership demonstrates the breadth of use cases Rafay can serve across the AI infrastructure ecosystem, supporting infrastructure intermediaries who make GPU capacity accessible at global scale just as effectively as we support the token factories building at the top of it," Budhani said.

Andrew Sobko, Chief Executive Officer of Argentum AI, said the company needed a partner that could support distinct software environments for each customer without sharply increasing complexity.

"Argentum's mission is to be the fastest, most flexible provider of turnkey GPU and power capacity for the world's largest AI operators, and Rafay is helping us accelerate our growth," said Sobko.

"We have built a global footprint of high-capacity data center sites and the operational expertise to deliver customized compute environments at scale to each customer, precisely when they need them. What we required was a software orchestration partner capable of matching that ambition, and Rafay gives us the tools to deliver a distinct, tailored software environment to every offtaker in our portfolio without multiplying operational overhead. With Rafay, we can continue leading this market and deliver the scale and precision demanded by the world's top AI infrastructure buyers," Sobko said.