Key Points
Akamai will supply Anthropic with cloud infrastructure capacity.
Anthropic also received a warrant to purchase up to 5% of Akamai's stock.
Shares of Akamai Technologies (NASDAQ: AKAM) rose on Friday after the cloud computing and cybersecurity specialist expanded its relationship with leading artificial intelligence (AI) model maker Anthropic.
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Partnering with an AI pioneer
Anthropic is committed to using $11.6 billion of Akamai's cloud infrastructure services over seven years. The deal can be increased by up to $9 billion, bringing the total potential value to over $20 billion.
For context, Akamai previously announced $2.8 billion in multi-year cloud customer commitments in its second-quarter earnings release in August.
Akamai said its infrastructure will support Anthropic's fast-growing central processor unit (CPU) workload demands. It's a notable statement, as it provides more evidence that AI computing needs are shifting beyond graphics processing unit (GPU)-powered model training to CPU-supported inference workloads.
Anthropic could become a major investor in Akamai
As part of the deal, Anthropic received a warrant to buy convertible preferred stock representing roughly 5% of Akamai's outstanding shares for $111.33 per share.
A portion of the warrant representing 2% of those shares vested along with the deal's announcement. The remainder will vest if Anthropic expands the agreement by the aforementioned $9 billion, in increments of 1% for every $3 billion commitment.
This deal with Anthropic should help accelerate Akamai's expansion by establishing it as a key supplier of distributed computing capacity to the world's leading AI model developers.
"Our expanding global footprint, combined with our years of experience serving the world's largest enterprises, positions us to be the infrastructure provider for secure and responsible AI applications and workloads," Akamai CEO Tom Leighton said.
Joe Tenebruso has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Akamai Technologies. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.