Anthropic is reportedly in early talks with Samsung over a custom AI chip. The Claude maker has begun early-stage work on its own processor. Samsung Electronics is a potential manufacturing partner. The Information first reported the discussions.
The move follows a clear industry pattern. Anthropic wants more control over the costly computing behind its models. It has relied entirely on chips rented from Amazon, Google, and NVIDIA. That dependence now collides with the soaring cost of running large models.
The talks remain preliminary, however. Anthropic has not decided what the chip will do. It has not settled how powerful it should be. Nor has it determined how the chip fits into a server. No detailed design, testing, or manufacturing has begun.
Anthropic is specifically eyeing Samsung’s advanced technology. It is evaluating Samsung’s 2-nanometer manufacturing process. It is also reviewing the company’s advanced chip-packaging facilities. Smaller nodes can pack more transistors for better performance and efficiency.
Signs point to a serious effort, though. Anthropic recently hired Clive Chan from OpenAI’s chip team. It also added Samsung, SK hynix, and Micron as investors in May. Those firms joined its Series H funding round as strategic infrastructure partners.
Anthropic stressed it is not abandoning current suppliers. It said NVIDIA GPUs, Google TPUs, and AWS Trainium remain central to its compute. On the Samsung talks specifically, the company declined to add more.
The report reflects a wider industry shift. NVIDIA still holds around 74% of the AI chip market. Nearly every major US AI firm now seeks to reduce that reliance. OpenAI unveiled its Broadcom-built Jalapeño chip last month. Google has its TPUs, and Amazon has Trainium. Landing Anthropic would give Samsung a marquee client. It would help Samsung’s foundry challenge market leader TSMC.
