AI Startup Nscale Chases ByteDance Deal and $1.8 Billion in Debt

Nscale, a startup that is less than a year old, is already trying to raise about $2.7 billion to build artificial intelligence infrastructure on the back of a pending partnership with ByteDance Ltd., the Chinese owner of TikTok, according to an offering document seen by Bloomberg.

The money, if Nscale follows through with the proposal, would allow the London-based company to build out data centers around the globe — filled with Nvidia Corp. chips — that would be rented out by companies such as ByteDance, in order to train and operate their AI models.

The biggest chunk of the ...