Microsoft to announces Maia 300 AI chip this fall, report says

Microsoft is preparing to show off its next AI chip within weeks, moving to close a gap with rivals who got a head start building their own silicon. 

The company plans to publicly unveil the Maia 300 chip this fall, potentially as early as next month, The Information reported Monday, citing people with direct knowledge of the plans.

Microsoft new AI chip  

The Maia processor was launched by Microsoft back in November 2023, however, it is far behind its major competitors Alphabet and Amazon, when it comes to scaling up its own in-house processor initiatives, which makes it less dependent on the pricey chips made by Nvidia than any other competitor of its caliber.

Google started generating revenues from its direct sales of Tensor Processing Units in the third quarter, whereas Amazon has witnessed increased adoption of its Trainium processors.

To close that gap, Microsoft has been negotiating with TSMC to secure manufacturing capacity for more than 300,000 Maia 300 units, targeted for delivery in 2027.

The company's longer-term goal is far larger: securing capacity for over 1 million chips, though the report noted that component supply constraints and ongoing negotiations with TSMC could limit how much of that target Microsoft actually reaches.

There is also one more element to the pitch because Anthropic itself announced recently that it is creating its own in-house semiconductor design team to create customised chips for its Claude series, thus becoming not only the potential buyer but also a future rival when it comes to customised chips.

In January, Microsoft revealed its next generation of Maia 200, which was created with the help of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and produced according to 3-nanometre technology. 

It is worth noting that Maia 200 includes a significant amount of in-chip SRAM, which is helpful for quicker response from AI to a large number of users' requests, a feature that is likely to be retained in Maia 300.