OpenAI, Amazon strike US$38 billion agreement for ChatGPT maker to use AWS

The deal is among the first major moves by OpenAI since it completed a restructuring last week

Amazon.com will supply OpenAI with cloud computing services under a multi-year US$38 billion deal, giving the ChatGPT maker access to hundreds of thousands of Nvidia graphics processors to train and run its artificial intelligence models.

The agreement announced on Monday (Nov 3) underscores the AI industry’s surging appetite for computing power, driven by the pursuit of technology capable of matching or surpassing human intelligence. It sent Amazon shares up 5 per cent in premarket trading.

OpenAI will begin using Amazon Web Services immediately, with all planned capacity set to come online by the end of 2026 and room to expand further in 2027 and beyond.

The deal is among the first major moves by OpenAI since it completed a restructuring last week that frees the ChatGPT maker to move away from its nonprofit roots. Reuters has reported it was laying the groundwork for an initial public offering that could value the company at up to US$1 trillion.

But surging valuations of AI companies and their massive spending commitments, which total more than US$1 trillion for OpenAI, have raised fears that the AI boom is inflating into a bubble. REUTERS