SAN FRANCISCO: Artificial intelligence leader Anthropic announced on Thursday a major expansion of its partnership with Google Cloud, securing a deal worth tens of billions of dollars to boost its AI computing power.
Under the agreement, Anthropic will purchase up to one million Tensor Processing Units (TPUs), custom-designed chips by Google, the San Francisco-based startup said.
The move is expected to add more than a gigawatt of computing capacity by the end of 2026, helping Anthropic meet the growing global demand for its Claude AI models, said Chief Financial Officer Krishna Rao.
Anthropic currently serves over 300,000 business customers worldwide.
Founded in early 2021 by former OpenAI employees, Anthropic was created to focus on safer AI development, addressing potential risks that its founders felt were not fully managed at OpenAI.
With backing from Amazon, Anthropic quickly became a key player in the generative AI race following the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in November 2022. The company has consistently released new models with advanced capabilities.
Though it lags behind OpenAI in user numbers and brand recognition, Anthropic has been recognized as a leader in AI for computer coding applications.
Google has been heavily investing in AI technology to compete with OpenAI, Microsoft, Amazon, and other tech giants. Its TPUs compete directly with Nvidia’s widely used GPUs.
“Anthropic’s decision to expand its TPU usage shows the strong performance and efficiency our teams have seen over the years,” said Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian. “We continue to innovate, improving capacity and efficiency of our TPUs.”
New AI Model Launch
Last month, Anthropic launched Claude Sonnet 4.5, its latest generative AI model, which it claims is the world’s top AI for computer programming.
The new model is also designed for advanced AI assistant applications, allowing the system to interact with computers much like a human user.
Anthropic plans to open an office in India next year, as global AI companies aim to expand in the world’s most populous country.
India’s demand for AI solutions is rising rapidly, with over 900 million internet users projected by the end of 2025, driven by both businesses and individual adoption.
Anthropic is currently valued at $183 billion, while OpenAI’s valuation has reportedly reached $500 billion following a private share sale, making it the world’s most valuable startup.
