Amazon has announced plans to sell its proprietary artificial intelligence (AI) chip, Trainium, externally, moving beyond its previous use solely within its cloud services. This marks Amazon's entry into the competitive global AI chip market, which has been dominated by Nvidia and AMD.
During a conference call on October 29, CEO Andy Jassy stated, "Demand for Trainium is very strong, and we are receiving requests from customers to use the chips outside of Amazon Web Services (AWS). We plan to start doing so in late 2027."
He added, "Selling chips externally will be a very significant business and will be entirely different from providing cloud infrastructure."
This decision is seen as a strategic move to reduce reliance on expensive Nvidia graphics processing units (GPUs) and signals Amazon's intent to directly compete with Nvidia and AMD in the market.
With Google already selling its own AI chip, the Tensor Processing Unit (TPU), Amazon's entry into external sales is expected to accelerate changes in the ecosystem of big tech companies developing their own chips.
In response to the explosive demand for AI, Amazon is also rapidly expanding its core AWS infrastructure. Jassy noted, "We are currently adding one AI accelerator approximately every 14 seconds, and customers are eagerly consuming the increased capacity."
As a result of these infrastructure investments, AWS reported third-quarter revenue of $46 billion, a 39.3% increase compared to the same period last year, marking its fastest growth in five years. The current backlog stands at $578 billion.
Jassy acknowledged some negative factors, such as rising memory prices, but reaffirmed plans for a total capital expenditure (CAPEX) of $220 billion this year, primarily focused on building AI data centers. He projected that AWS revenue would grow by 40% in both 2027 and 2028, transforming into a $1 trillion business within the next 5 to 10 years.
Additionally, Amazon reported explosive growth for its enterprise AI platform, Bedrock, with token processing volume increasing 17-fold and spending by Fortune 500 companies rising seven times.
Regarding concerns about potential advertising revenue impacts from external AI agents like Meta's Muse and OpenAI's DALL-E, Jassy stated, "The majority of consumers still prefer to access retail sites directly." He added that Alexa, which combines customer purchase history with a streamlined payment ecosystem, will maintain its competitive edge.
* This article has been translated by AI.
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