SpaceX leased the full capacity of its Colossus 1 data center in Memphis to Anthropic after running into technical challenges using the facility for Grok, according to people familiar with the matter cited in a Bloomberg report.

The company had planned to use Colossus 1 as part of a larger cluster of three data center campuses to train and run its most advanced artificial intelligence models. But SpaceX faced latency issues when trying to connect the Memphis site with two other locations more than 10 miles away, the report said.

Those delays were worsened by aging network infrastructure and hardware differences across the facilities. Colossus 1 reportedly contains a mix of Nvidia chip generations, including Hopper and Blackwell systems, along with older accelerators. Colossus 2 and Colossus 3 were built more uniformly around Nvidia’s Blackwell chips.

That matters because large AI training clusters need thousands of chips to stay synchronized. If one location has slower connections or older hardware, faster systems can be forced to wait, reducing the performance of the broader cluster.

Rather than continue trying to integrate Colossus 1 into its internal Grok training system, SpaceX decided the facility would be more valuable as a leased compute asset for outside customers.

Anthropic has agreed to use Colossus 1’s full computing power, giving the Claude maker access to more than 220,000 Nvidia processors and about 300 megawatts of capacity. 

The deal gives SpaceX a major new revenue stream as it pitches investors on its shift from rockets and satellites into AI infrastructure.

SpaceX has also signed a computing deal with Google, further supporting the company’s roadshow narrative that AI compute could become one of its largest businesses.

Still, the Colossus 1 shift highlights the complexity of Musk’s data center ambitions. SpaceX has promoted the speed at which the Memphis facility was built, but training frontier models requires more than raw chip counts. Networking, hardware uniformity, and facility design can be just as important.

SpaceX has not abandoned its own AI efforts. Chief Financial Officer Bret Johnsen recently said the company is still developing internal AI services, including Grok. Musk has also said SpaceX could reclaim compute from Anthropic if internal demand becomes tight, after giving advance notice.

For investors, the story cuts both ways. Leasing Colossus 1 to Anthropic turns underused infrastructure into revenue. But it also shows that SpaceX’s AI buildout is still a work in progress, even as the company sells Wall Street on a future built around compute, Grok, and orbital data centers.