Akamai Lands Seven-Year Anthropic Cloud Deal, Sparking Analyst Divide

Akamai's seven-year Anthropic cloud pact carries $11.6B committed, up to $20.6B with options; shares jumped as much as 21% premarket.

Akamai Technologies has locked in a seven-year cloud infrastructure agreement with AI developer Anthropic, a contract that ranks as the company's largest-ever booking and reshapes its growth trajectory. The deal carries a committed volume of $11.6 billion, with contractual options that could push the total as high as $20.6 billion through an additional $9 billion in extensions.

The arrangement centers on dedicated compute capacity tailored for CPU workloads. News of the pact jolted the stock, which had closed Thursday at EUR 97.34 before surging as much as 21% in premarket trading on Friday to EUR 118.00. By later in the session, the advance had settled to roughly 13%, with shares changing hands at EUR 109.22 as early profit-taking tempered the initial euphoria and fresh price-target hikes lent support.

Heavy Upfront Spending Precedes Revenue

Delivering the promised capacity won't come cheap. Akamai pegs total contract-related capital expenditures at approximately $5.5 billion, including an extra $1.7 billion earmarked for 2026 alone. Those funds are meant to secure critical components—storage units above all—and the company has enlisted partners to move quickly. Jabil has been authorized to procure roughly $1.7 billion worth of memory components, while Lenovo will supply hardware, software and services under a multi-year arrangement.

The outlay represents a substantial advance commitment before the project bears financial fruit. Management left its 2026 revenue forecast untouched, and the first revenue from the contract isn't expected until the second half of 2027, projected at $150 million to $300 million. From there, the annualized revenue run rate tied to the deal should climb to about $1.7 billion by the end of 2028.

Warrant Ties Anthropic to Akamai's Equity

The partnership extends beyond commercial terms into ownership structure. Akamai issued Anthropic a warrant for non-voting Series B preferred shares convertible into roughly 7.7 million common shares—equal to as much as 5% of outstanding stock—at an exercise price of $111.33 per common-share equivalent. About 2% of that stake is tied to the base contract, with the remaining 3% vesting progressively as the extension options are drawn upon.

Analysts Split on Valuation

Institutional reaction has been mixed. BofA Securities reportedly raised its price target on Akamai from $175 to $185 while reaffirming a Buy rating, with analysts seeing further upside on the strength of the Anthropic win. Piper Sandler also turned more bullish, upgrading the shares to Overweight with a $125 target. Citigroup took the opposite tack, trimming its target from $160 to $122 and keeping a Neutral stance.

Market watchers broadly read the long-term commitment from a major customer as validation of Akamai's technological competitiveness, though the scale of the upfront investment remains a point of close scrutiny among investors.