Amazon has struck a deal to invest up to $4 billion in ChatGPT rival Anthropic as it seeks to compete with Microsoft and Google for generative AI dominance.
The ecommerce group will initially invest $1.25 billion in the San Francisco-based company, which offers AI assistant Claude, in exchange for a minority stake. Anthropic has also agreed to use Amazon Web Services as its primary cloud provider and AWS-designed chips to build and train its foundational models.
Google invested $300 million in Anthropic for an approximate 10% stake in February. The generative AI company announced at the time that Google would be its preferred cloud provider.
Big tech investments in generative AI have escalated this year as they seek to capitalize on the development of cutting-edge technology. Microsoft confirmed in January a $10 billion investment in ChatGPT maker OpenAI having already pledged $1 billion in 2019. AI chip maker Nvidia took part in enterprise-focused generative AI startup Cohere’s $270 million Series C, while Google has made several bets including Runway and Hugging Face.
VC investments have also been climbing this year with $18.7 billion invested this year across 316 deals, according to PitchBook. At the current pace, venture dealmaking in the generative AI space should reach record numbers for both deal value and count.
Aside from Amazon and Google, Anthropic is also backed by several VCs including Spark Capital, Sound Ventures and Salesforce Ventures from whom it raised $450 million in May. It was most recently valued at $5 billion although likely to be worth more following the Amazon deal.
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