Zuck's AI ambitions put Meta on course to become America's next big cloud provider
Renting out spare compute is simply the natural progression for any sufficiently large infra company
By The Register
Meta is exploring plans to launch a cloud computing business by renting out excess AI computing power and models to outside customers, positioning itself as a potential major competitor to Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud. CEO Mark Zuckerberg confirmed the strategy is “on the table” during a recent shareholder meeting, stating that selling access to computing power “makes sense” given long-term customer demand.
The company is debating whether to offer access to AI models hosted on its infrastructure or to sell raw computing capacity in a model similar to CoreWeave. Meta plans to build 7 gigawatts of computing infrastructure this year and add another 7 gigawatts next year, bringing total capacity to 14 gigawatts.
Analysts from Wolf Research estimate the new cloud business could generate more than US$50 billion in revenue by 2028 and approach US$100 billion by 2030. Deutsche Bank projects the third-party cloud business could contribute incremental revenue of approximately USD 15 billion to USD 36 billion in 2027.
Meta’s stock surged 18 per cent on Friday following the cloud infrastructure announcement and the launch of its Muse Spark 1.1 AI model. Zuckerberg said Meta has not yet pursued a cloud business offering for the time being because the company believes it has a use for its current compute capacity.