Who they are KW41 edition from October last year I still remember: At that time I had about Bavaria's application for the AI Gigafactory Blue Swan reported
An ambitious project with 100,000 specialized AI chips, which should be positioned as a strategic counterweight to the established AI centres in Frankfurt and Stuttgart. As a potential location, the former barracks area of the Conn Barracks in Schweinfurt in conversation.
Since then, a lot has happened. It's time for an update, and what can I say, that's more concrete than I expected at the time.
Where are we with Schweinfurt's AI data center?
The project is out of the rumours and application phase and has arrived in the middle of the German bureaucracy Olympics: the Development plan procedure. (Thanks to Berlin for the explanation) What sounds dry at first glance is actually a good sign, because without building law nothing happens, and this procedure runs.
The Conn Barracks Intermunicipal Industrial Park Association who is responsible for the conversion of the approximately 200-hectare former barracks site, has October 2025 meeting the preparation of the development plan ‘Commercial park Conn Barracks – Blue Swan’ decided. Since then, a lot has happened:
January 2026: Preliminary draft approved, early public participation launched. February 2026: Participation deadline expired, comments received. In April 2026 then the meeting of the working group XPLORE. June 2026: The comments received were discussed, weighed and incorporated into the revised draft at the special purpose association meeting on 18 June. The draft development plan, as amended on 11 June 2026, was approved. Official Gazette of the Government of Lower Franconia He published a notice on the 26th..
And now the crucial thing: From 29 June 2026, As of today, it is Draft for public interpretation. The participation period runs until 31 July 2026. If you have any objections or comments, you can submit them until then. All relevant documents can be found at District of Schweinfurt.
Just scroll down the page and you will find the current status bulky hidden behind links like this: Publication of the notice on the implementation of public participation pursuant to Paragraph 3(2) of the BauGB and the participation of public authorities and other public bodies pursuant to Paragraph 4(2) of the BauGB for the development plan ‘Gewerbepark Conn Barracks – Blue Swan’.
A prosit for the German bureaucracy! After all, the poster is not in the planning office of the building office on Alpha Zentauri. 😉
Sidenote: While Villabajo is still being cleaned, Villarriba is already celebrating, because in Erlangen we are already further:
In general, the Free State of Bavaria is already massively expanding its AI infrastructure and is Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nuremberg (FAU) the largest AI computing infrastructure in the German higher education landscape to date.
The most important details about the expansion in Erlangen:
Addition of 1,024 NVIDIA processors: Through a new contractual partnership with NVIDIA, the National High Performance Computing Center Erlangen (NHR), headed by Prof. Gerhard Wellein, will be equipped with 1,024 new high performance processors (GPUs).
Massive computing power: Together with the existing stock, the new Bavarian AI base model in Erlangen will in future be around 1,400 GPUs In the future, the number is expected to increase to up to 1,700 GPUs.
Financing: The Free State of Bavaria invests In this infrastructure alone €54.5 million This is the largest financial investment by a federal state in this area.
Timetable & Implementation: The technical implementation takes place together with the partner Megware They are already building FRITZ and ALEX accompanied. From the autumn of 2026, the development teams will be able to access the expanded capacities exclusively if everything works out.
Background and objective of the project: The enormous computing power in Erlangen forms the foundation for the development of the so-called Blue Swan platform. This is an independent, trustworthy and multi-modal AI basic model for key application fields such as health and robotics. The project is designed as an open source model to enable external partners to participate.
What this means: Nothing is definitively certain.
Clearly: For Schweinfurt, an ongoing development planning process does not yet mean a gigantic AI data center of its own. Experience has shown that there is still a lot of way between public interpretation and the groundbreaking ceremony: Further balancing rounds, possible objections, statute resolution, development planning. Did you know: Dit is keen sprint, dit is marathon!
But at least: The project is real. It has gone through procedural steps, it has a schedule, and there is a structure (the Special Purpose Association) that actively takes care of it. This is more than many other projects of this magnitude, which often did not go beyond the press release phase.
At the same time, there is a second procedure for the ‘Southern part’ the site to be developed as a classic industrial area (GE). As far as I understand this also independently of Blue Swan and without changing the land use plans, because the municipality of Geldersheim which has already been reported accordingly.
TL:DR
Update on Blue Swan: The planned AI data center on the Conn Barracks near Schweinfurt is slowly taking shape
Back in October, I had asked whether Schweinfurt/Bavaria had a realistic chance to prevail against Frankfurt or other established locations. The answer to this question is still pending, but at least the local part of the puzzle is currently being actively assembled. YAY!
For the region, Blue Swan would be a significant economic factor. The Conn Barracks site was an ‘open wound’ in the cityscape of Schweinfurt after the withdrawal of US forces: 200 hectares of land that have been waiting for years for their reuse. An AI data center of this size would not only be technologically interesting, but also A real gain in location for a region that Not only since the end of the barracks but also the current Crisis of automotive suppliers here in the region We urgently need to reinvent.
I'm keeping an eye on the project. If there is something new after the interpretation deadline at the end of July, here is another update.