Rao: Compute fungibility separates AI economics from traditional software and manufacturing
Krishna Rao · Inside Anthropic's $100 Billion Al Compute Commitment | CFO Krishna Rao · Invest Like The Best · May 13, 2026 · at 52:51
Anthropic CFO Krishna Rao explains the financial mechanics of AI infrastructure and why traditional cost-accounting models fail to capture compute flexibility.
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“That paradigm does not exist in a company like a software company or a factory, right? If you can't repurpose, if you have a bunch of people doing R&D and that's your R&D expense, they can't go and become cogs, right? And vice versa in most traditional companies. Here, You really have that fungibility that's possible, and I think that's where the return on compute is so important, and I think people are beginning to understand that, but there's still a tendency towards treating it like, you know, oh, I have to separate these two costs, when in actuality, you know, they're very self-reinforcing, and that flexibility is actually what helps to drive revenue short-term and long-term.”
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