Elon Musk opens xAI data centers to Anthropic in surprise AI deal

Anthropic has struck an unexpected deal with Elon Musk-owned SpaceX to expand computing capacity for its Claude AI models.

The agreement gives Anthropic access to 300 megawatts of new compute power from SpaceX’s Colossus 1 data center in Memphis, Tennessee, which was originally built to support xAI’s Grok chatbot.

The facility reportedly contains more than 220,000 Nvidia processors and is expected to provide the extra capacity within a month. The deal comes as Anthropic faces growing demand for products such as Claude Code, its AI coding assistant.

Anthropic has also discussed partnering with SpaceX on future orbital data center projects that could eventually deliver several gigawatts of compute power.

The agreement stands out because top AI firms rarely rent infrastructure to direct rivals in the race for advanced AI models. Musk has repeatedly criticized Anthropic in the past and previously accused the company of drifting away from its original mission. In a post on X, Musk once said he believed Anthropic risked becoming “misanthropic.”

His tone changed this week after meetings with Anthropic executives. Musk said he decided to approve the deal after being impressed by the company’s efforts to ensure Claude remains “good for humanity.”

He added that no one at Anthropic had triggered his “evil detector,” though he warned he would remove any client from xAI facilities if their AI systems harmed humanity.

The move has drawn attention across the AI industry because it could signal a new business strategy for SpaceX and xAI. Reports suggest xAI has already shifted much of its internal AI training work to the newer Colossus 2 system, leaving room to lease capacity to outside firms. Musk also recently signed a similar compute agreement with AI coding startup Cursor.

SpaceX’s entering the cloud computing business could create another revenue stream ahead of a potential public offering. Investors are also watching whether Musk’s companies can turn massive AI infrastructure investments into stable commercial income.

Anthropic announced the partnership during its first developer conference in San Francisco. The company said the added capacity would allow it to double Claude Code rate limits for paid users and remove peak-hour usage caps on some plans.

Anthropic also introduced a new “dreaming” feature designed to help Claude learn between sessions by reviewing user workflows and updating stored context automatically.