The investment is part of a broader trend of big tech firms investing heavily in AI startups. Microsoft, for example, invested $10 billion in OpenAI in January 2023, while Nvidia, Salesforce 1, and Google have also made significant investments. Google is also an investor in Anthropic. Despite the size of Amazon's investment, it was not the largest AI deal of the week, with Elon Musk's AI startup xAI raising $5 billion in a funding round that valued it at $50 billion.
Key takeaways:
- Amazon has agreed to invest an additional $4 billion in AI startup Anthropic, bringing its total investment to $8 billion.
- The deal includes Anthropic naming Amazon Web Services as its primary cloud provider and using AWS Trainium and Inferentia chips to build, train and deploy its models.
- Other tech giants such as Microsoft, Nvidia, Salesforce 1 and Google have also made significant investments in AI startups, with Google also being an investor in Anthropic.
- Elon Musk's generative AI startup xAI raised $5 billion in a funding round, making it the biggest AI deal of the week.