Anthropic to pay Akamai $11.6 billion over seven years in cloud deal

Anthropic will spend $11.6 billion over seven years on Akamai’s cloud infrastructure, marking the largest deal in Akamai’s history. This commitment is more than six times the size of a previous $1.8 billion agreement reported in May. The deal represents a significant bet on CPUs, which handle tasks like running code and web browsing, as AI agents become more sophisticated. Akamai expects to see revenue from the deal starting in the second half of 2027, reaching an annual pace of about $1.7 billion by the end of 2028. To support this capacity, Akamai plans to spend approximately $5.5 billion on infrastructure and is adding $1.7 billion to this year’s capital spending for advance component purchases. As part of the arrangement, Akamai issued Anthropic a warrant for nonvoting preferred stock convertible into 7.7 million common shares, representing up to 5% of the company’s outstanding stock at $111.33 per share. The contract includes provisions for further expansion; each additional $3 billion Anthropic commits to Akamai’s cloud services unlocks roughly another 1% of stock. Consequently, the total deal value could potentially grow by as much as $9 billion, reaching a total of $20 billion. This marks the first time Akamai has attached a warrant to a cloud deal.