Anthropic has struck a $3.4 billion deal for 1.7 gigawatts of heavy-duty gas-fired generators that another company had already ordered, the Financial Times reported Sunday, citing a person familiar with the matter. The paper called it the largest known single purchase of power-generation equipment by an AI lab.
Anthropic secured the commitments from OnePWR Solutions, an equipment supplier based in San Antonio, in late September, according to the FT’s source. OnePWR had ordered the generators from Caterpillar about two years ago but needed financing to complete the transaction, Investing.com wrote in its summary of the report. Anthropic had first planned to become a OnePWR customer, then chose to take over the existing equipment orders instead. According to the report, the deal also includes the engineering and construction capabilities needed to install the generators. Anthropic did not buy OnePWR itself, and none of the supplier’s employees moved to the AI company.
Anthropic’s own IPO paperwork explains why a lab would want generators in hand. In the amended S-1 it filed with the SEC on Nov. 2, the company said “certain of our planned data center facilities rely on dedicated on-site natural gas-fired generation, which exposes us to fuel price volatility and supply disruptions that are outside of our control.” The same filing lists turbines and generators among equipment that has faced extended delivery timelines, price increases and allocation constraints, and it says some infrastructure must be ordered years in advance with large pre-delivery payments. Anthropic also said it generally bears fuel costs on a pass-through basis, without cost caps.
That filing describes a shift in how Anthropic gets its compute. Alongside fixed-term cloud contracts, it now leases chips directly and hosts them in dedicated facilities operated on its behalf, an arrangement it calls Anthropic Direct. The company reported about $895.4 billion in commitments, substantially all of it for compute and infrastructure, with roughly $447.5 billion expected before the end of 2030, as WebProNews reported when the amended filing posted.
Other AI companies have gone after power gear directly, too. Investing.com’s summary also cited xAI’s $2 billion purchase of mobile gas turbines earlier this year and Alphabet’s acquisition of energy developer Intersect in late 2025. SpaceX acquired xAI in February. Google is also turning to gas at a new site. Its $17 billion Wyoming data center plan, announced Thursday, includes a 702 MW fuel-cell development contracted with AEP that converts natural gas into electricity, with carbon capture and storage. Google has since taken over the Wyoming site Crusoe had been preparing.
The generator purchase surfaced as Anthropic prepares to go public. The FT reported Friday that the company intends to list before Thanksgiving, despite the recent selloff in tech stocks.
WebProNews is an iEntry Publication