New Rules Could Force AI Divestment

The investments in question are substantial, with Amazon committing a total of $8 billion and Google over $3 billion to Anthropic. These are not merely financial stakes; they are strategic partnerships designed to secure cloud computing resources and drive AI development. These deals are deeply integrated with hardware. Anthropic uses Amazon's custom Trainium and Inferentia chips and Google's Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) to train and deploy its models. This gives Amazon and Google a direct feedback loop for their silicon development while locking in a key AI customer for their cloud services. Federal regulators are already scrutinizing these relationships. The Federal Trade Commission launched an inquiry in early 2024 into the investments by Amazon, Google, and Microsoft into Anthropic and OpenAI, seeking to understand their impact on the competitive landscape. The core antitrust concern is that a few dominant cloud providers could control the foundational AI layer, potentially distorting innovation and undermining fair competition. Regulators are examining whether these partnerships create barriers to entry for other AI developers who lack similar access to capital and massive-scale computing infrastructure. Forced divestment in the tech sector on national security grounds is rare but not unprecedented. The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) has ordered divestitures, such as in early 2026 when a Chinese-controlled firm was required to sell its interest in a U.S. semiconductor business. Such a move against U.S. firms would be more legally complex but could be pursued under aggressive antitrust theories. Critics argue it would chill U.S. investment in a critical technology sector, creating uncertainty that could drive talent and innovation to other countries.