Anthropic is still grappling with the economics of compute

Anthropic's updated S-1 filing ahead of its IPO shows revenue growing to $17 billion in the quarter ended September 30, up from $11.5 billion the prior quarter, but operating losses also widened due to rising compute costs. Compute consumed 58% of revenue, up from 48% the previous quarter, and revenue per dollar spent on compute fell from a peak above 2x to 1.72x. To meet surging demand, Anthropic spent $10 billion on compute in the quarter, including $5.0 billion under short-term commitments that cost significantly more than multi-year deals. The company has turned to "neoclouds" such as SpaceX, Nscale, Akamai, and Volta for flexible but pricier capacity. Anthropic expects compute and infrastructure expenses to remain its largest operating expense for the foreseeable future despite efforts like "Anthropic Direct" to build its own compute base. The article notes these are "champagne problems" given rapid revenue growth, but highlights the company's vulnerability to risks in the trillion-dollar infrastructure buildout, such as bond market jitters or local opposition to data centers.

(Source：TechCrunch)