• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, February 20, 2025

People may think about Wyoming's wide-open spaces populated more with moose, deer, elk and antelope than people, but maybe that’s what the ad-tech industry really needs. 

Population in the state is growing fast, with 587,618 people across the entire state as of 2024, up from 494,300 in 2000, according to the United States Census Bureau. It is the least populated state in the union.

Hiding among these rural spaces are some very wealthy entrepreneurs such as Taylor Sheridan, writer and director of hit television shows like "Yellowstone." U.S. Senator Cyntha Lummis in 2022 worked on a bill that would help establish a framework for cryptocurrency in the state.

One media entrepreneur who lives in the state has made an offer to buy TikTok for $47.5 billion, according to The New York Post. Rumor has it he wants to turn Wyoming into the AI and technology capital of the U.S.

“Let’s bring TikTok to Wyoming,” the 40-year-old Reid Rasner wrote on his Facebook page, adding in another post that he wants companies to invest in the state.

Rasner, who has founded several firms in Wyoming and is currently heading up a media company, lost the race for U.S. Senate in the Wyoming Republican party in 2024 to John Barrasso.

The Post reports Rasner seeks “a controlling stake” in TikTok’s assets, operations and proprietary algorithm at a price of $47.45 billion, according to a copy of a Tuesday letter obtained by The Post.

Rasner’s lawyer has already sent the offer to ByteDance, the app’s Chinese parent company.

“By establishing TikTok’s operations in Wyoming, Reid will ignite a new era of economic diversification, creating thousands of high-paying jobs that will not only benefit the tech sector but also supercharge Wyoming’s energy, agriculture, and tourism industries,” the letter from Rasner Media counsel Steve Roberts states, The Post reports.

There is plenty of room to build server farms and energy plants to support ad-tech and artificial intelligence (AI) in Wyoming, which is what Bill Gates is doing in Kemmerer, Lincoln County.

Gates backed the construction of a nuclear power plant in Kemmerer through his company, TerraPower, which replaces coal-fired plants to fight climate change. The plant will use a new reactor design called Natrium. 

It’s a $4 billion project and collaboration between TerraPower, Gates, and U.S. Department of Energy.

The project originally was delayed, according to a local news organization, but that’s to be expected in a state that can dip below zero degrees off and on in January and February.

The company's designs took a significant step toward reality in 2024 when the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) accepted TerraPower's construction permit application for review, according to Benzinga.

"Construction will begin (in 2025) on the so-called ‘energy island,' which is where the steam turbines and other machinery that actually generate power will sit," Gates wrote in an email to Benzinga in January. "The plant hopefully will come online in 2030."

Update: Kemmerer in Lincoln County, Wyoming.