Anthropic Signs $13.7 Billion Compute Lease Deal with Rum Group

Anthropic has signed a six-year, $13.7 billion compute lease agreement with Rum Group, according to The Information, citing people familiar with the matter. The deal centers on Rum Group's data center under construction in Maysville, Georgia, which has 120 megawatts of grid capacity and potential expansion to 180 megawatts.

The agreement also includes an option for Anthropic to purchase up to 51 million shares of Rum Group at $0.01 per share, tied to compute purchase volumes. Half of the option is linked to usage at the Maysville facility, while the other half requires Anthropic to procure an additional 400 to 500 megawatts of compute at another Rum Group site.

Rum Group, formerly the conservative video platform Rumble, acquired German cloud provider Northern Data in June in an all-stock deal valued at approximately $767 million, and then rebranded as Rum Group to enter the AI cloud computing business. The acquisition brought 22,000 Nvidia Hopper GPUs and the Georgia data center project.

However, Rum Group said in an August securities filing that it "does not yet have the funds" for data center construction and GPU purchases, and expects to cover most expenses through debt or equity financing. Sources said Rum Group plans to finance the Georgia project through borrowing.