Anthropic to build custom AI chips
What's the story
Anthropic, a leading artificial intelligence (AI) start-up, has announced plans to build its own in-house silicon team. The move is aimed at designing custom chips for its Claude AI model. The company confirmed the development through a job listing and an official statement. An Anthropic spokesperson told Business Insider that the new team will co-design hardware and models to improve Claude's performance at scale.
Strategy
Continuing with a 'multi-chip approach'
The spokesperson also clarified that Anthropic will continue with a "multi-chip approach," incorporating hardware from AWS, Google, NVIDIA, and AMD into its scaling efforts.
This comes after reports of the company's interest in developing its own chips.
A recent job listing for a "custom silicon team" revealed that Anthropic is looking for engineers with experience in various chip design and verification fields.
Recruitment
Salary range for engineer position
The job listing for the engineer position, with a salary range of $320,000 - $485,000, specifies that candidates should have a "direct personal contribution" to the finalization and shipping of semiconductor designs.
The role is targeted at those who have successfully shipped silicon before and can make crucial decisions independently.
Progress
Earlier exploration of chip development
Anthropic's move to develop custom chips for Claude is a continuation of its earlier exploration of this possibility.
Back then, the project was still in its early stages with no dedicated team or final chip design.
There were also reports of potential collaborations with Samsung for chip manufacturing, but no official confirmation from either company has been made yet.
Market response
Custom silicon quest fueled by AI chip supply constraints
The rising cost of securing enough computing power for larger and more capable AI models has driven companies like Anthropic to explore custom silicon.
This comes as the supply of advanced AI chips remains limited, pushing firms away from off-the-shelf hardware toward processors optimized for their software.
Earlier this year, Anthropic partnered with Google and Broadcom on TPUs to strengthen its computing capabilities.