Yesterday, we talked about one of the potential winners of the AI surge. Today, we are giving you another.

As one of the largest companies in the world with a massive and growing cloud computing business through AWS, Amazon (AMZN) has accumulated significant capital reserves that it has been looking to invest strategically in high-potential areas.

Artificial intelligence has emerged as one of the most promising and profitable technologies of the coming decades, with applications across virtually every industry.

Through its AWS cloud division, Amazon is well-positioned to support the development and deployment of advanced AI systems.

In addition to providing the critical digital infrastructure and compute resources that many AI startups rely on through AWS, the company is now directly investing in and collaborating with the most innovative early-stage AI businesses.

The company has announced a $230 million commitment to support artificial intelligence startups through funding and cloud credits distributed via its AWS platform.

As part of the investment, $80 million will fund a second cohort of the AWS Generative AI Accelerator program.

This initiative provides top early-stage startups building generative AI technologies with mentorship, education, and up to $1 million in AWS credits each to help scale their work.

Amazon Vice President Matt Wood noted the strategic importance of this accelerator, stating that 96% of all AI/ML unicorns currently run on AWS, demonstrating its position as the preferred cloud provider for advanced AI development.

In addition to the accelerator funding, Amazon will distribute $150 million directly to AI startups in the form of AWS credits that can be used to cover rapidly growing cloud computing costs.

This funding continues Amazon’s track record of offering over $1 billion in annual cloud credits to startups globally.

As cloud infrastructure usage and costs rise alongside increased adoption of AI, providers like AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud actively compete for customers by offering lucrative credit packages.

Earlier this year, Amazon expanded the machine learning models eligible for credits through its platform.

By investing heavily in startup funding and credits, Amazon aims to strengthen its dominant market position amid rising demand for AI products and services that drive further cloud adoption.

This latest commitment shows Amazon’s commitment to fueling generative AI innovation by strategically supporting next-generation technologies and companies.

For Amazon, enabling artificial intelligence has the potential to become a highly profitable long-term growth driver across its business as the technology permeates more and more industries in the coming years.

Best regards,

Joel Litman & Rob Spivey
Chief Investment Strategist &
Director of Research
at Valens Research

This portfolio analysis highlights the same insights we share with our FA Alpha Members. To find out more, visit our website.