Anthropic, Microsoft in talks about Maia 200 AI chip deal

Microsoft is in discussions to provide its custom artificial intelligence chips to Anthropic, as confirmed by CNBC on Thursday.

A potential agreement would be a significant win for Microsoft, positioning the company ahead of cloud competitors Amazon and Google in the realm of supplying clients with specialized AI silicon. Microsoft unveiled its second-generation Maia AI chip in January, with plans to integrate it into its Azure cloud service in the near future.

Although discussions are ongoing, Anthropic has not finalized a deal with Microsoft regarding the utilization of the Maia 200, according to a source familiar with the matter. The Information first reported on these negotiations earlier on Thursday.

Microsoft’s stock remained relatively stable following the news.

Last November, Microsoft announced a $5 billion investment in Anthropic, while Anthropic committed to a $30 billion expenditure on Azure services. Anthropic also relies on cloud solutions from Amazon and Google.

Discussing the company’s computational challenges, Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei mentioned at a recent event that the demand for computing capacity has increased due to the rising popularity of its Claude assistant and Claude Code tool for AI-assisted programming.

Recently, SpaceX revealed that Anthropic has agreed to pay $1.25 billion monthly until May 2029 for computing resources.

Historically, Anthropic has heavily depended on Nvidia’s graphics processing units for training and running generative AI models. In previous agreements, Anthropic announced plans to utilize Amazon Web Services’ custom Trainum chips in a $100 billion 10-year deal and Google’s tensor processing unit chips in October.

Both Anthropic and Microsoft have not yet provided official comments on the ongoing discussions.

During Microsoft’s earnings call in April, CEO Satya Nadella highlighted the capabilities of the Maia 200 chip, stating that it offers significant performance improvements over existing silicon in their data centers. He confirmed that the chips are already operational in Microsoft’s facilities in Arizona and Iowa.

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