Global tech giant Google is massively upping its investment in Anthropic, creators of Claude AI. The $2 billion investment, first reported by the Wall Street Journal and confirmed by an Anthropic spokesperson to Decrypt, will be made in two payments of $500 million and another of $1.5 billion.
This $2 billion commitment from Google is a significant step up from the $400 million the global search giant put into Anthropic in February. Last month, e-commerce titan Amazon committed to investing $4 billion in Anthropic.
A Google spokesperson declined to comment on the deal.
The hefty investment from Google is the latest move in the ongoing AI arms race between Google, Microsoft, and Amazon. On Tuesday, Microsoft announced a partnership worth $3.2 billion with the Australian government to build data centers and provide training in artificial intelligence to Australian citizens. Like Microsoft, Google also invested in the Oceanic country to the tune of $1 billion.
While Amazon and Google are pouring money into Anthropic, Microsoft appears committed to its long partnership with OpenAI, creators of ChatGPT. Using ChatGPT-4 and the Browse with Bing feature, ChatGPT Plus subscribers can search the internet directly through ChatGPT. Browse with Bing was taken offline for several months after it was discovered users could use it to bypass paywalled content.
For those not inclined to pay $20 a month for the more robust version of ChatGPT, Microsoft has integrated ChatGPT and OpenAI’s Dall-E into its free Edge browser.
Not content with investing in other companies, Google also launched its own ChatGPT competitor called Google Bard in February. Like Claude AI and ChatGPT, Bard is a generative AI chatbot that uses prompts to produce audio, code, images, and text content.
Adding to its list of AI investments, Google last month launched the $20 million Digital Futures Project to support “responsible AI” development, including combatting bias and including diverse perspectives in AI model training.
“Getting AI right will take more than any one company alone,” Google Director of Product Impact Brigitte Gosselink said at the time. “We hope the Digital Futures Project and this fund will support many others across academia and civil society to advance independent research on AI that helps this transformational technology benefit everyone.”
Edited by Ryan Ozawa.