The Tachyon9 chief executive made an early call that infrastructure, rather than models or chips, would be artificial intelligence's binding constraint, and the 2026 delay wave is now putting that thesis to the test.
NEW YORK, June 11, 2026. The year 2026 was supposed to be the one in which America's AI buildout caught up with demand. Instead it has become the year of the delay. According to industry reports cited by Nixxy, Inc. (NASDAQ: NIXX) in an announcement issued today, nearly half of all U.S. AI data center projects planned for 2026 deployment have been delayed or canceled, and analysts cited by the company estimate that more than 7 gigawatts of anticipated AI computing capacity may fail to come online as originally scheduled.
For Shahal Khan, chief executive officer of Tachyon9 Corporation, the moment reads less like a shock than a confirmation.
"We recognized early that AI's greatest bottleneck would not be models or GPUs - it would be infrastructure," Khan said in the announcement, which laid out how the proposed strategic combination of Nixxy and Tachyon9 is designed to attack that bottleneck directly. "The industry is now seeing what happens when demand for AI compute collides with limited power availability and delayed data center construction."
A career spent close to the pipes
Khan arrived at that view from an unusual set of vantage points. A graduate of American University with a degree in economics, he has ventures on the books dating back to Global Voice Telecom in 1997, when bandwidth rather than compute was the scarce commodity being built out at industrial speed. In January 2021 he founded Burkhan World Investments, and as chairman and chief executive of BurTech Acquisition Corp. he steered that vehicle's combination with AI chipmaker Blaize to a close on January 13, 2025. Blaize Holdings, which had raised more than $330 million from backers including DENSO, Mercedes-Benz, Magna and Samsung, began trading on Nasdaq as BZAI the following day.
"We are pleased to announce the successful completion of our merger, marking a significant milestone in bringing value for our shareholders," Khan said at that closing.
The Blaize transaction put Khan on the silicon side of the AI economy. What he did next signaled where he believed the harder problem lay. Tachyon9, the Coral Gables, Florida, company where he serves as chairman and chief executive, describes itself as a specialist in energy infrastructure, transmission equipment and data center assets, the layer beneath the chips. In January 2026, Tachyon9 entered a joint venture with Robo.ai (NASDAQ: AIIO), with a planned first project of a 20-megawatt data center serving Asia-Pacific and Middle East markets. "The global edge-based AI data center market is projected to surpass $50 billion by 2030, with the Middle East and Asia capturing a rapidly growing share," Khan said in that announcement, which identified him as executive chairman of Tachyon9.
Looked at in sequence, the stops share a direction of travel. Each one moved Khan closer to the physical layer where technology cycles tend to get stuck, and the newest venture plants him squarely in it.
The thesis the market caught up with
When Khan says the industry "is now seeing" the crunch, the independent record largely supports him. Sightline Climate's February 2026 "Data Center Outlook," authored by analyst Olivia Wang, tracked more than 16 gigawatts of U.S. capacity slated for 2026 across roughly 140 large projects, with only 5 gigawatts actually under construction. Given that track record, Wang wrote, it "wouldn't be surprising" if 30 to 50 percent of the capacity slated for 2026 ended up delayed.
The strain is visible at the top of the industry. "The biggest issue we are now having is not a compute glut, but it's power," Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella said on the Bg2 Pod in November 2025. "It's not a supply issue of chips; it's actually the fact that I don't have warm shells to plug into."
Even the equipment needed to work around the grid is spoken for. GE Vernova reported in April that its gas turbine backlog had reached 100 gigawatts, with data centers accounting for roughly 20 gigawatts of it. "2026 and '27 are largely sold out; we are approaching filling out '28," GE Vernova chief executive Scott Strazik said last July.
Nakota and the behind-the-meter bet
The vehicle for Khan's thesis is the proposed Nixxy-Tachyon9 combination, set out in a binding letter of intent disclosed this week. According to the companies, the plan centers on the Nakota project in Williston, North Dakota, a 620-acre site intended to scale to a full gigawatt of capacity, with a Phase 1 buildout of 120 MW slated for Q2 2027. Tachyon9 contributes approximately $64 million in equipment, land option rights for the Nakota project, and a signed LOI for the entire 1 GW development, while Nixxy brings its public market platform, telecommunications infrastructure, AI technologies, and capital markets capabilities. Through its development pipeline, the companies say, Tachyon9 is pursuing approximately $1 billion of planned capital investment, largely through debt facilities and construction loans, backed by projected offtake agreements.
The delay-avoidance mechanism rests on behind-the-meter gas turbines, on-site generation that does not wait in the utility interconnection queue. Khan put it directly in the announcement: "We are building behind the meter gas turbines, so we avoid these delays."
He is in growing company. Behind-the-meter generation can reach first power in roughly 18 months, according to Data Center Knowledge and SemiAnalysis research, while grid connection waits run four to seven years in markets like Northern Virginia, Phoenix and Dallas, per Bloomberg and Data Center Dynamics reporting citing Sightline data. Per Grist and Marketplace, 46 data centers totaling some 56 gigawatts now plan their own behind-the-meter power, a roster that includes flagship projects backed by Crusoe, Chevron and ExxonMobil.
What has to happen next
The combination remains at the binding LOI stage, with a definitive agreement, financing, and equipment procurement still ahead of it, all in a turbine market where, as Strazik's comments make clear, queue position carries real weight.
The demand backdrop suggests the window stays open. The four largest hyperscalers have guided to roughly $725 billion of combined 2026 capital spending, up 77 percent from 2025, according to Tom's Hardware's aggregation of first-quarter earnings. And as OpenAI president Greg Brockman put it on CNBC last September, "no matter how much gets built, we are still going to be in this world of compute scarcity."
Khan, for his part, frames the project as the destination his career has been pointing toward. "Our vision with Nixxy/Tachyon9 is to develop an integrated platform capable of delivering power-ready AI infrastructure at a time when the market needs it most," he said in today's announcement. The companies have set the first checkpoint themselves: a Phase 1 buildout of 120 MW, slated for Q2 2027.
About Nixxy, Inc.
Nixxy, Inc. (NASDAQ: NIXX) is an AI communications and data infrastructure company focused on next-generation digital infrastructure platforms positioned at the intersection of artificial intelligence, high-performance compute, energy, and data center infrastructure. The Company is pursuing large-scale opportunities supporting the rapidly growing global demand for AI compute capacity, sovereign AI initiatives, and next-generation energy-backed digital infrastructure. For more information, visit www.nixxy.com.
About Tachyon9
Tachyon9 is a private operating company specializing in energy infrastructure, transmission equipment, and data center assets. Tachyon9 serves as the primary asset and revenue contributor in the proposed transaction, contributing approximately $64 million in equipment, land option rights for the Nakota project, and a signed LOI for the entire 1 GW development.
Contacts
Investor Relations: Nixxy, Inc., [email protected] Media: John Arundel, Managing Director, Perdicus Global Communications, Washington, DC, [email protected], (703) 963-4191
Forward-Looking Statements
This communication contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including statements regarding the proposed strategic combination between Nixxy, Inc. and Tachyon9 Corporation, planned capital investment, development timelines, projected offtake agreements, and anticipated market conditions. Forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations and involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied. Investors should review the risk factors described in the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on April 15, 2026, and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Nixxy undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements except as required by law.