Microsoft Spending on Anthropic Approaches $500 Million a Year

Microsoft is reportedly upping its spending on Anthropic, chief rival to partner OpenAI.

According to a report Wednesday (Jan. 14) by The Information, Microsoft has become one of Anthropic’s top customers.

The tech giant is now on track to spend around $500 million per year to use Anthropic’s artificial intelligence (AI) in Microsoft products, the report said, citing a source with direct knowledge of the matter.

In addition, Microsoft has increased its focus on selling its cloud customers Anthropic AI models, which could drive more revenue for both firms.

The company recently informed salespeople in its Azure cloud business that selling Anthropic AI models to Microsoft cloud customers will count toward their sales goals just like Microsoft-made software, two Microsoft employees told The Information.

Because Microsoft has offered the same incentive for sales staff for selling OpenAI products, the new quota system means sales people have as much incentive to sell Anthropic models as ones from its main competitor, the sources said.

As the report noted, Microsoft’s increasing ties to Anthropic follow its decision in September to make an up-to-$5 billion investment in the company. Microsoft has invested more than $13 billion in OpenAI, giving it a 27% stake in the startup.

But while Microsoft keeps 80% of sales of OpenAI models to Azure customers, it retains a smaller percentage of its sales of Anthropic’s AI models, a source briefed on the situation told The Information.

OpenAI announced in October that it had transformed its for-profit arm into a public benefit corporation, an arrangement that provides Microsoft with a 27% stake — worth roughly $135 billion — in that unit.

“What began as an investment in a research organization has grown into one of the most successful partnerships in our industry,” the ChatGPT maker wrote on its blog at the time.

In other Microsoft news, PYMNTS wrote this week about the company’s new agentic AI capabilities, which it says are designed to help retailers move faster, operate with greater efficiency and engage shoppers with more relevance by enhancing human decision-making.

“The approach focuses on connecting traditionally fragmented functions — merchandising, marketing, store operations and fulfillment — into coordinated workflows that can anticipate needs and act in real time,” the report added.

Microsoft said this shift reflects a wider move within the industry toward intelligence-driven retail operating models created for speed, resilience and scale.

As PYMNTS wrote, it shows how the company is pushing AI “deeper into retail operations, positioning intelligent automation as a unifying layer across the entire retail value chain.”