Anthropic PBC has agreed to rent AI cloud computing capacity valued at $45 billion from Nscale's data center project in West Virginia, according to reporting on Wednesday. The purchase commitment runs for six years and is intended to secure substantial compute power as the AI company prepares for a planned initial public offering.
Under the arrangement, Nscale will deploy Nvidia Corp.'s Vera Rubin chips to meet Anthropic's compute requirements. The chips are scheduled to begin coming online late next year. The commitment equates to about 460 megawatts of power - a level Nscale calculates is enough to supply roughly 345,000 U.S. homes simultaneously.
The contract covers the first of three buildings planned for Nscale's Monarch campus. Once fully developed, the complete campus will deliver about 1.35 gigawatts of capacity. Nscale expects development of the entire campus and an on-site power plant to cost approximately $71 billion, with $47 billion of that total earmarked for AI chips. Servers in the remaining buildings are slated to start providing power in 2028.
Anthropic has been securing large computing commitments in recent months. The company behind the Claude AI assistant has signed multiple deals, including a $50 billion arrangement with Fluidstack, a $10 billion agreement with Volta Infra Holdings Ltd., and a separate $45 billion deal with SpaceX. In May, Anthropic was valued at $965 billion, the reporting noted.
Earlier in the year Microsoft Corp. signed a letter of intent for the West Virginia site in March but withdrew from the opportunity earlier in the summer. That departure cleared the way for Anthropic to assume the role of tenant for the initial building at the Monarch campus.
The Nscale transaction is significant for the company as it positions itself for an initial public offering as soon as next month. Nscale is described as part of a group of firms termed "neoclouds" that lease AI-focused computing power.
Summary
Anthropic has committed $45 billion to lease AI cloud capacity from Nscale's Monarch campus in West Virginia over six years, securing roughly 460 megawatts of power to be served by Nvidia Vera Rubin chips coming online starting late next year. The deal is one of several large capacity agreements Anthropic has signed while preparing for a planned IPO.