Nscale, a London-based developer of data centers for artificial intelligence, has hired Justin Osofsky, an 18-year veteran of Meta Platforms, as its chief operating officer as it prepares for a New York stock listing, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Mr. Osofsky, who held a series of executive jobs at Meta and was most recently its chief partnerships officer, will report to Josh Payne, Nscale’s chief executive, and oversee the company’s global operations, the person said. The person spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public. The hire is meant to speed an expansion tied to the company’s coming initial public offering.
Nscale was spun off from a cryptocurrency mining operation in early 2024. It has since become one of the more prominent newcomers supplying the computing power behind the A.I. boom, a so-called neo-cloud operator that rents computing resources to companies building A.I. systems. Its partners include Nvidia and Microsoft.
The company filed in September for an initial public offering in New York to raise money for equipment. Nscale is seeking to raise as much as $3 billion, Bloomberg News has reported.
Mr. Osofsky joins a cluster of Meta alumni around the company. Sheryl Sandberg, Meta’s former chief operating officer, sits on Nscale’s board and helped recruit Nick Clegg, Meta’s former head of global affairs, and Fidji Simo, a former OpenAI executive. Ms. Sandberg has compared Mr. Payne’s thinking and leadership to those of her former boss, Mark Zuckerberg.
Meta did not respond to a request for comment.