Anthropic job posting suggests it’s eyeing Alberta for data centre buildout

Anthropic Co-Founder and CEO Dario Amodei at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023.
AI giant hiring community engagement manager and national compute lead to bring “gigawatts of compute” to Canada.

New job postings suggest Anthropic is looking to significantly increase its data centre footprint in Canada, with a particular focus on Alberta. 

The news: The US-based AI giant created multiple job postings for new Canadian roles that will be in charge of getting more data centres built in the country. One posting is for a Canadian compute lead to manage the company’s data centre build-out strategy in the country, while another posting is looking for a data centre community engagement manager based in Alberta. 

Anthropic confirmed the job postings to BetaKit, but did not elaborate on its Canadian data centre strategy or why it’s specifically targeting Alberta. 

From the source: The compute country lead “will be ultimately responsible for bringing gigawatts of compute online in Canada,” according to the job posting. The position is responsible for selecting, leasing, and financing data centre sites, as well as other logistical and government relations work. 

Meanwhile, the community engagement manager will “coordinate charitable giving, community investment, and economic development commitments” in their data centre markets. 

The context: The postings show Anthropic continuing to add to its Canadian roster after hiring Amazon’s former head of Canadian public policy, Jacob Glick, in the same role earlier this month. 

Anthropic is joining multiple AI companies looking to strengthen its much-needed compute capabilities in Canada. Alberta has positioned itself as a friendly jurisdiction for that upcoming buildout. Last month, Meta announced a $13-billion investment to build Canada’s largest data centre northeast of Edmonton. 

Final thought: AI companies are increasingly finding a need for community engagement managers as communities push back on data centres. Angus Reid Institute polling shows more than two-thirds of Canadians oppose having data centres built near where they live. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei acknowledged the negative public view of AI in an X post this week, and said his company is ramping up efforts to win back trust and deliver on its world-benefiting promises. 

BetaKit’s Prairies reporting is funded in part by YEGAF, a not-for-profit dedicated to amplifying business stories in Alberta.

Feature image courtesy TechCrunch via Flickr, licensed under CC BY 2.0.

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