Anthropic Signs $35B Cloud Deal With Nvidia-Backed Lambda

Anthropic has entered into a massive $35 billion cloud computing agreement with Lambda, a provider that remains largely outside the public eye. The deal secures capacity at a data center in Nueces County, Texas, which is being constructed by Hut 8, a former cryptocurrency mining firm. While the Wall Street Journal first reported the terms and Reuters confirmed them with a source familiar with the matter, neither Anthropic nor Lambda has issued an official statement, and no specific financial details beyond the headline figure have been disclosed.

The structure of this transaction reveals a complex web of dependencies centered on Nvidia. Lambda holds the lease for the facility, but Nvidia has a separate contractual arrangement with Hut 8 to secure the site’s capacity. Lambda then deploys Nvidia’s hardware within that space. This creates a scenario where Nvidia influences the deal in three distinct ways: it has invested in the tenant (Lambda), contracted for the physical site through Hut 8, and supplies the essential chips. This mirrors a strategy Nvidia has pursued throughout the year, helping cloud providers navigate the financing and real estate hurdles required to deploy its systems. This approach aligns with a revenue-sharing program Nvidia launched in July, which was paused shortly after due to internal antitrust concerns.

For Anthropic, this commitment follows a rapid series of large-scale contracts. Earlier in the same month, the company agreed to spend $45 billion over six years with Nscale for West Virginia-based capacity. Additionally, Amazon announced that Anthropic will invest more than $100 billion on AWS over the next decade, securing five gigawatts of power and access to Trainium3 silicon. While significant, the Lambda deal is not the largest in Anthropic’s portfolio. The company also signed a $9.1 billion, 20-year agreement with Riot Platforms, another former bitcoin miner, and a substantial package involving Google and Broadcom. Reports also indicate early discussions to lease $10 billion of compute from Meta, despite the two firms competing for similar engineering talent and enterprise budgets.

This diversification strategy reflects a deliberate choice to avoid reliance on a single supplier. By spreading its commitments across multiple vendors, Anthropic mitigates the risk of dependency. However, this diversification masks a underlying concentration issue. Most of these diverse contracts ultimately rely on the same vendor’s chips housed in facilities secured through similar mechanisms. Bitcoin miners like Hut 8 and Riot appear frequently in these deals because they possess critical infrastructure,grid connections, land, and power agreements,that took years to assemble. These resources are now scarcer than the chips themselves.

Texas has emerged as a primary destination for such projects due to its cheap land, independent electrical grid, and streamlined permitting processes. These factors make it the default choice for companies needing to scale up rapidly. Importantly, none of these multi-billion dollar figures represent immediate costs. They are long-term obligations tied to future revenue growth. Anthropic’s current run rate has exceeded $30 billion, making the arithmetic behind these contracts defensible for now. Yet, whether the company can sustain the exponential growth required to fulfill these pledges remains an open question. Each contract represents a bet that demand will continue to surge, locking in prices today before the market reality of tomorrow becomes clear.