SpaceX inks compute deal with Reflection AI, an open-source AI lab
Reflection AI will pay $150 million a month beginning July 1, 2026 through 2029 for immediate access to Nvidia's latest GB300 AI chips and supporting hardware across SpaceX's Colossus 2 data center near Memphis, Tennessee.
First came Anthropic , then Google . Now, open-source AI startup Reflection is tapping SpaceX for its abundant source of AI chips.
Reflection AI will pay $150 million a month beginning July 1, 2026 through 2029 for immediate access to Nvidia’s latest GB300 AI chips and supporting hardware across SpaceX’s Colossus 2 data center near Memphis, Tennessee, the company told TechCrunch. The deal is worth up to $6.3 billion and either company has the option to end the contract with 90 days’ notice after the first three months.
The deal is smaller than SpaceX’s deals with Anthropic and Google, which cost the companies $1.25 billion per month and $920 million per month respectively. Those contracts also run through July 2029, although Elon Musk has publicly downplayed the three-year term, emphasizing that the contracts can be cancelled at any time.
Reflection used the compute deal — its first — to tout the value of its open-weight AI strategy , which it has pitched as an open-source alternative to closed frontier labs like Anthropic and OpenAI. Open-weight AI models, which publicly release their trained parameters, have received more attention following the U.S. government’s ban of Anthropic’s closed models, Fable and Mythos.
The startup, which was founded in 2024 by two former Google DeepMind researchers, said the compute deal is one of the largest announced open AI infrastructure commitments to date.
“Recent events highlight how important open source is to the AI ecosystem, with more nations and enterprises recognizing the risks and costs associated with exclusively depending on closed models,” a spokesperson said in an emailed statement. “Our deal with SpaceXAI signals Reflection’s strategic importance within the frontier AI ecosystem, and more compute means more runway to build the world’s best open models at scale.”
The Colossus data center was originally built by xAI, a company founded by Elon Musk that is now part pf SpaceX, for its own AI efforts. As its internal pursuits have faltered, SpaceX leveraged its valuable AI chip holdings and began renting them out to some of the world’s top AI labs.
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Key takeaways
- The partnership between Reflection AI and SpaceX highlights the growing demand for open AI infrastructure.
- SpaceX's business model shift may inspire Brazilian companies to explore new revenue streams.
- Brazil could benefit from the transition to open AI models, fostering a more diverse ecosystem.
Editorial analysis
The partnership between Reflection AI and SpaceX represents a significant milestone in the artificial intelligence ecosystem, especially at a time when the debate over the openness and transparency of AI models is intensifying. For the Brazilian tech sector, this transaction can serve as an example of how local startups can seek strategic collaborations with global players to access cutting-edge infrastructure. Reflection's emphasis on open-weight AI models reflects a growing trend that could inspire similar initiatives in Brazil, where open innovation and collaboration are key to technological development.
Moreover, SpaceX's decision to lease its AI infrastructure, originally built for its own projects, indicates a paradigm shift in how tech companies utilize their resources. This could pave the way for other Brazilian companies with underutilized hardware capabilities to explore similar business models, generating new revenue streams and driving innovation.
Another point to watch is the increasing importance of open AI models in response to regulatory constraints and security concerns. With the ban on closed models like those from Anthropic, the demand for open alternatives is likely to rise, creating a favorable environment for the growth of startups adopting this approach. Brazil, with its strong community of developers and researchers, could benefit from this transition, fostering a more diverse and resilient ecosystem.
Finally, the reflection on the importance of transparency and accessibility in AI is particularly relevant in a global context where trust in emerging technologies is at stake. As more countries and companies recognize the risks associated with reliance on closed models, Brazil could position itself as a leader in ethical and responsible AI practices, seizing the opportunity to develop solutions that meet both local and global needs.
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