- Amazon.com Inc. is set to inject up to $4 billion into Anthropic, marking a pivotal move in its ambition to establish itself as a major player in generative artificial intelligence and demonstrating strong support for the burgeoning startup. Under this agreement, Anthropic will migrate a significant portion of its software to Amazon Web Services (AWS) data centers and leverage AWS's in-house chips to train the models powering chatbots and other applications.
- In addition to benefiting from Amazon's formidable computing resources, Anthropic will receive a financial boost that will help cover the substantial costs involved in training and operating massive AI models. According to AWS Chief Executive Officer Adam Selipsky, Amazon's initial investment in Anthropic stands at $1.25 billion. Amazon will hold a minority stake in the startup, as stated in a joint announcement on Monday. In response to this development, Amazon's stock surged by 1.6% to reach $131.21.
Why it matters
Amazon executives have emphasized that the field of generative AI is still in its early stages, highlighting that over 100,000 customers have already utilized the company's machine-learning tools. Anthropic's foundational model, named Claude, was previously accessible as part of an Amazon service called Bedrock, which is still in the early release phase, offering both Amazon's and third-party models to customers.
