Elon Musk’s SpaceX has struck a deal to offer over 300 megawatts of computing power from the Colossus 1 data centre in Memphis to Anthropic. The deal unites two direct competitors in the field of AI, and could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year to SpaceX.
Key Highlights
- Anthropic will gain access to more than 300 MW of compute at SpaceX’s Colossus 1 data centre in Memphis, Tennessee.
- The price of the deal is worth about $1.5 million to $2 million in megawatts per year.
- Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei reported that his firm saw 80x growth in usage and annualised revenue in the first quarter of 2026 alone.
- Musk stated that xAI will cease as a separate company and will be added onto SpaceX in the future under the name SpaceXAI.
Anthropic Enters Into 300 Megawatt Computing Deal With SpaceX’s Colossus 1 In Memphis
Anthropic has struck a contract for over 300 megawatts of computing capacity from Colossus 1, drawn from a large data centre operated by SpaceX in Memphis, to meet surging demand for its Claude AI software. The partnership would significantly enhance Anthropic’s computing resources and allow it to increase usage limits for its AI products, the company said.
Though details were not disclosed, with market rates between $1.5 million and $2 million per megawatt per year is standing comfortably as a potential for hundreds of millions in annual business for SpaceX. Anthropic has also proposed working with SpaceX to build up several gigawatts of orbital AI compute power, alluding to Musk’s historically clear vision for data centres powered by solar energy in space.
Why Anthropic needed this deal and what Musk said about Claude
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said at a conference that his firm is racing as fast as it can to have access to more computing power after growing 80x annualised revenue and usage in Q1 2026. There is a higher demand as the customer base has now started using Claude for coding, automation of tasks and enterprise applications.
Last week, Musk said he met with senior Anthropic personnel before agreeing to the deal to use Colossus 1. The significance of the deal is obvious since Anthropic is in direct competition with xAI, and Musk has consistently been a close-to-vocal adversary of OpenAI, which happens to be Anthropic’s biggest competitor.
xAI Is Getting Dissolved Into SpaceX And Its Most Recent Co-Founder Just Joined Anthropic
On the same day this deal was announced, Musk stated xAI would no longer operate as an independent company and it would be absorbed into SpaceX moving forward, known as SpaceXAI. Musk has been restructuring xAI, placing SpaceX staff directors to streamline software infrastructure and optimise chip use.XAI had the full ability to lease its tons of compute, and just last month an internal memo showed it was running at a dismal 11% capacity.
The latest competitive layer was added when Ross Nordeen, the last of xAI’s founding team to stay at the company, said via LinkedIn on Wednesday that he is now also joining Anthropic’s compute team. Nordeen had been at Tesla for the years leading up to xAI, working on computing infrastructure.
FAQs
- What did Anthropic sign with SpaceX?
A contract to use over 300 megawatts of processing power in SpaceX’s Colossus 1 data centre in Memphis to satisfy rising demand for Claude.
- How big could that deal get？
Pricing at market rates of $1.5-$2 million per megawatt per year, terms were not disclosed, but this represents hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
- Why does Anthropic need computing?
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei revealed that in Q1 2026, Claude demand propelled the company to a staggering 80x increase in annualised revenue and usage users.
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