Compute

Sachin Katti steps down after a year leading infrastructure; Uday Ruddarraju, former xAI infrastructure head, takes over the compute organization.

Founders project 10,000x compute demand growth over five years and argue AI-designed custom chips can address bottlenecks faster and cheaper than building new data centers.

The former a16z partner bundles chip access with venture capital, betting that hardware scarcity—not capital—is the real constraint on frontier AI development.

The AI startup locked in compute contracts worth $517 billion over 11 months—nearly three times its prior $180 billion projection—as it races to match rivals' scale ahead of a potential public offering.