Anthropic May Spend Up to $750 Billion on AI Infrastructure Ahead of IPO, WSJ Reports

Anthropic may spend as much as $750 billion on computing infrastructure over the coming years as it prepares for an initial public offering.

Bloomberg reported on Oct. 20, citing The Wall Street Journal, that Anthropic has signed about $450 billion of computing infrastructure contracts for the next seven to 10 years, according to a draft IPO registration statement. Most of those commitments are non-cancelable.

The company’s largest contracts include $111 billion with Google Cloud, $110 billion with Amazon Web Services and $31 billion with Microsoft. Anthropic has been ramping up investment to secure the chips and data-center infrastructure needed to develop AI models and expand its services.

Spending on computing infrastructure totaled about $9 billion in the first half of this year, nearly four times the $2.3 billion spent a year earlier. That was also above the company’s full-year spending of $7.3 billion last year.

Accounting losses tied to the heavy investment also widened. Anthropic posted a net loss of $80.7 billion in the first half, up sharply from $13 billion a year earlier. Of that total, $72 billion was an accounting charge stemming from changes in the value of financial instruments such as convertible notes, rather than actual cash outflows.

Despite the large loss, Anthropic has emphasized improving profitability. The company previously told investors it reached adjusted profitability in the third quarter, the report said. Gross margin topped 85% in the quarter, adjusted operating margin exceeded 11%, and free cash flow was also positive.

Anthropic is expected to publicly file its IPO documents within the next few weeks. It could begin formally marketing the offering as early as the week starting Nov. 9 and list before the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday. At the latest, the company is projected to go public by year-end. Proceeds from the IPO are slated to be used for AI chips, data centers and hiring.