Fermi Fires CEO After He Throws Temper Trantrum

TL;DR

Fermy America fired CEO Toby Newower after he belligerently confronted a Cabinet secretary over an imaginary South Korean investment at an Nvidia conference.

Key Points

• 1.Fermy America IPOed at $15B valuation despite zero revenue. The AI data center company co-founded by Rick Perry raised $746M in October 2025 — a tiny fraction of the tens of billions needed for its Project Matador data center campus in Amarillo, Texas.
• 2.The company burned through cash rapidly with no tenants lined up. By end of 2025, Fermy had only $48M left in the bank, failed to execute any definitive lease agreements, and satellite imagery from April 2026 confirmed construction had effectively stopped.
• 3.CEO Toby Newower's temper tantrum occurred at Nvidia's GTC conference. He loudly accused Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnik of blocking a South Korean investment that appeared to exist only in Newower's imagination — security had to physically remove him, per Politico.
• 4.The board fired Newower and CFO on April 17, 2026. He was replaced by two co-CEOs: COO Jacob Blaes and board member Anna Bofa, who will serve part-time while simultaneously running a separate AI startup called Crate.
• 5.Newower's post-firing call to sell the company is unrealistic. With $48M cash, ~$1B book value, $300M+ in liabilities, and zero revenue, no acquirer would pay the $3.4B market cap premium — and data center equipment shortages make Project Matador's completion near-impossible regardless of funding.