AMD announces it will invest up to $5 billion in Anthropic

US semiconductor manufacturer AMD announced on Wednesday that it is preparing to invest up to $5 billion in emerging artificial intelligence company Anthropic, while the two companies also announced a partnership that includes a large order to purchase processors.

The deal is an indicator of AMD’s ambitions, based in California, to compete with Nvidia in the high-performance AI chip market.

Under the agreement, Anthropic is expected to purchase up to 2 gigawatts of AMD’s latest chips, known as the Instinct MI450.

Anthropic will also use AMD’s large-scale Helios platform, a computing platform developed by AMD to compete with Nvidia in the AI infrastructure sector.

AMD stated that the use of the first gigawatt will begin in 2027.

AMD CEO Lisa Su said in a statement that “this collaboration combines Anthropic’s leadership in advanced AI with the full potential of high-performance computing provided by AMD.”

She added that the two companies aim to accelerate the widespread adoption of AI.

Anthropic co-founder Tom Brown said, “Access to computing capabilities is essential to keeping Claude at the forefront of development and meeting the demand from our customers,” referring to the chatbot developed by the company.

The company stated that AMD has committed, under the partnership, to making a “strategic investment in Anthropic shares worth up to $5 billion in the future,” which represents less than 1% of the company’s estimated valuation of $965 billion.

This collaboration follows an extended partnership AMD announced with OpenAI in October to develop dedicated AI data centers.

Despite Nvidia’s dominant position in the AI market with its graphics processing units (GPUs), AMD’s partnerships with leading startups in the field, such as OpenAI and Anthropic, are helping it strengthen its position and solidify its credibility in the sector.

However, some investors believe that orders resulting from such partnerships may artificially inflate demand for chips.

Under the agreement signed in October, AMD granted OpenAI the right to purchase up to 160 million shares through a stock purchase agreement, a financial instrument that can be converted into actual shares upon meeting certain conditions, potentially allowing the AI giant to own approximately 10% of AMD in the future.