Akamai

Anthropic’s commitment to spend $11.6 billion on Akamai’s cloud infrastructure over seven years represents a significant shift in how AI companies structure compute deals, anchoring the arrangement to CPU capacity rather than the GPU-focused arrangements that have dominated the sector. The warrant structure ties Akamai equity to Anthropic’s spending milestones, reversing the typical pattern in which chip suppliers invest directly in AI labs.

• Anthropic committed $11.6 billion over seven years to Akamai, more than six times a $1.8 billion deal announced in May.
• Akamai issued Anthropic a warrant convertible into up to 7.7 million common shares, or about 5% of outstanding stock, at $111.33 per share.
• The deal hinges on Akamai meeting delivery and service-availability requirements, with either party able to terminate under specified conditions.

• $11.6B Total value of Anthropic’s seven-year compute commitment to Akamai.
• $1.7B Expected annual revenue pace by end of 2028, starting second half of 2027.
• $5.5B Capital spending Akamai expects to deploy building out cloud capacity for the deal.
• 5% Maximum equity stake Anthropic can acquire through warrant exercise if full spending occurs.

TechCrunch reported on Friday (September 25) that Anthropic will pay Akamai $11.6 billion over seven years for dedicated cloud computing capacity and managed support services. The value dwarfs an earlier arrangement between the companies announced in May, when Bloomberg reported an $1.8 billion computing deal. According to Akamai’s securities filing, the commitment depends on Akamai meeting certain delivery and service-availability requirements, and both parties retain termination rights under defined conditions including material breach or change of control.

Akamai’s largest deal focuses on CPU infrastructure, not GPUs

The arrangement marks Akamai’s largest contract in company history and reflects growing demand for CPU capacity as AI agents take on broader operational tasks. Rather than the GPU-centric infrastructure that has dominated AI compute discussions, this deal centers on general-purpose chips that handle code execution, data processing, and web browsing. Akamai declined to specify what tasks Anthropic will assign to the CPU capacity, leaving the actual use case unclear to investors and competitors.

Akamai will not recognize revenue from the deal this year. On an investor call Thursday, executives disclosed expectations of $150 million to $300 million in revenue beginning in the second half of 2027, ramping to an annual pace of roughly $1.7 billion by the end of 2028. To support the infrastructure buildout, Akamai plans to spend approximately $5.5 billion in capital deployment and is adding $1.7 billion to its 2026 capital spending to pre-purchase components such as memory.

Warrant structure ties equity to spending milestones in reverse of typical AI deals

Akamai issued Anthropic a warrant convertible into up to 7.7 million common shares or approximately 5% of Akamai’s outstanding stock at $111.33 per share. This represents the first time Akamai has attached a warrant to a cloud services agreement and inverts the standard pattern in AI infrastructure deals, where chipmakers and cloud providers typically invest equity directly in the AI labs that become their customers.

About 2% is expected to vest, or become available to Anthropic, upon Anthropic’s first payment under the agreement. The rest is tied to Anthropic spending more. Each additional $3 billion it commits to Akamai’s cloud services unlocks roughly another 1%, so the deal could grow by as much as $9 billion, to about $20 billion in total. AMD employed a similar warrant structure with OpenAI last year, anchoring equity grants to chip-purchase milestones.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei told the New York Times last December that the company does not participate in such investment arrangements “at the same scale as some other players,” yet Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and AMD have all invested in or committed capital to Anthropic while supplying chips or cloud capacity.

Market reaction and questions around deal enforcement

Akamai shares rose as much as 17% in after-hours trading on Thursday, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The deal contains several provisions that could limit its actual value. The Master Services Agreement allows Anthropic to terminate each project plan upon notice of a material outage, subject to certain conditions, and grants Anthropic a right to exit upon a change of control of Akamai in favor of a direct competitor. Akamai retains the right to terminate if Anthropic materially breaches and fails to cure the breach. Either party may exit if the other enters bankruptcy or if no active project plan remains in effect, raising the question of whether Anthropic will remain committed to full spending as AI infrastructure markets evolve and alternative suppliers emerge.

The BlockWest read. Anthropic’s shift toward CPU capacity signals confidence that general-purpose computing will drive near-term AI economics, yet the arrangement’s escalating warrant structure suggests Akamai views this as a speculative bet on Anthropic’s long-term scale rather than a contract backed by immediate revenue certainty. The deal’s termination clauses and outage-based exit rights leave material performance risk unresolved.

Watch for Akamai’s 2027 revenue recognition from the deal, expected to commence in the second half of that year, which will reveal whether Anthropic’s CPU spending matches the $150 million to $300 million guidance executives provided and whether the deal’s milestones track toward the projected $1.7 billion annual pace by late 2028.