Explained: Why Anthropic could owe Amazon $110 b even if it doesn't use all the cloud capacity it has committed to buy
Anthropic could be required to pay Amazon billions of dollars for cloud computing services even if it does not use the full capacity it has agreed to purchase, under a long-term contract that commits the artificial intelligence company to spend at least $110 billion with Amazon Web Services (AWS) through April 2036.
The commitment, disclosed in Anthropic’s registration statement filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ahead of its proposed initial public offering (IPO), highlights the financial obligations underpinning the AI boom.
It also shows how cloud infrastructure agreements can expose AI developers to substantial costs as they scale their operations.
Anthropic has agreed to spend a minimum of $110 billion on Amazon’s cloud services through April 2036, regardless of how much computing capacity it ultimately uses.
The agreement includes a contractual true-up provision. If Anthropic’s actual spending falls below the committed amount, it must pay the difference. The contract is non-cancellable, except in cases involving a material breach by Amazon.
This means Anthropic cannot simply reduce its cloud usage and automatically avoid the financial commitment. If its computing needs turn out to be lower than expected, the minimum-spending clause could still leave it liable for a substantial payment.
The arrangement gives Amazon greater visibility into future revenue while securing a long-term customer for its cloud infrastructure business. For Anthropic, it provides access to computing resources needed to develop, train and operate increasingly sophisticated AI models.
Amazon’s relationship with Anthropic extends well beyond cloud services. The technology giant has invested $13 billion in the AI company since 2023 and retains the option to invest another $20 billion, according to the filing.
Amazon has also agreed to provide up to $15 billion in financing, released in $5 billion tranches tied to Anthropic meeting specified computing-capacity milestones.
The filing shows that Amazon holds $6.2 billion in outstanding convertible notes, while its ownership stake in Anthropic is capped at 12%. Its shares carry no voting rights, and Amazon has neither a board seat nor an observer position.
Amazon has also developed significant computing infrastructure to support the partnership, including its Rainier AI data centre campus, which is dedicated to training and running Anthropic’s models.
Anthropic’s proposed stock market listing could bring greater scrutiny to the financial commitments required to sustain its growth.
Anthropic reported revenue of $16.29 billion in the first half of 2026, up from $1.16 billion in the same period a year earlier. It also reported a net loss of $80.7 billion, largely driven by accounting charges linked to changes in the value of convertible notes.
Cloud infrastructure is a major part of the economics of developing advanced AI systems. Training and operating models require substantial computing capacity, making long-term agreements with providers such as Amazon, Google and Microsoft central to the industry's expansion.
Anthropic disclosed that 48% of its revenue in the first half of 2026 came through relationships with Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure.
Amazon is not the only major technology company with a financial interest in Anthropic. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, has an option to purchase up to $10 billion of Anthropic’s Class N common stock in a private placement alongside the IPO, at the same price as the public offering.
Also Read | Anthropic isn’t the end of man
The option could increase Alphabet’s equity exposure, although the filing does not confirm whether it will be exercised.
The arrangements illustrate the complex ties between AI developers and technology giants. Amazon and Alphabet provide funding and computing infrastructure while also competing in the market for AI models and services.
Sayantani Biswas is an assistant editor at Livemint with seven years of experience covering geopolitics, foreign policy, international relations and global power dynamics. She reports on Indian and international politics, including elections worldwide, and specialises in historically grounded analysis of contemporary conflicts and state decisions. She joined Mint in 2021, after covering politics at publications including The Telegraph. <br> She holds an MPhil in Comparative Literature from Jadavpur University (2019), with a specialisation in postcolonial Latin American literature. Her research examined economic nationalism through Eduardo Galeano’s Open Veins of Latin America. She also writes on political language, cultural memory and the long shadows of conflict. <br> Biswas grew up in Durgapur, an industrial town in West Bengal shaped by migration, which drew families from across India to the Durgapur Steel Plant. As the only child in a joint family, she spent years listening—almost obsessively—to her grandparents’ testimonies of struggle, fear and loss as they fled Bangladesh during the Partition of 1947. This formative exposure to lived historical memory later converged with her training in Comparative Literature, equipping her to analyse socio-economic structures and their reverberations. <br> Outside the newsroom, she gravitates towards cultural history and critical theory, returning often to texts such as Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. As a journalist, she is committed to accuracy, intellectual rigour and fairness, and believes political reporting demands not only clarity and speed, but historical depth, contextual precision, and a disciplined resistance to spectacle.
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