April 2 Reuters Amazon Web Service AWS has expanded its free credits program for startups to cover the costs of using major AI models, the company told Reuters in an interview, as it looks to boost the market share of its AI platform Bedrock.

In a move to attract startup customers, Amazon now allows its cloud credits to cover the use of models from other providers including Anthropic, Meta, Mistral AI, and Cohere.

This is another gift that we39;re making back to the startup ecosystem, in exchange for what we hope is startups continue to choose AWS as their first stop, said Howard Wright, vice president and global head of startups at AWS.

The move followed Amazon39;s nowcompleted 4 billion investment in Anthropic in convertible notes. As part of the deal, Anthropic will use AWS as its primary cloud provider, and Trainium and Inferentia chips to build and train its models.

Wright said Amazon39;s free credit will contribute to revenue of Anthropic, one of the most popular models on Bedrock.

That39;s part of the ecosystem building. We are unapologetic about that, he said, adding that AWS offers a wide range of choices and security to startups.

Amazon said it has offered over 6 billion in credits to startups in the past decade.

In a partnership with Y Combinator, it39;s offering 500,000 in credits for the latest cohort launched in January, which can be used on AI models and Amazon39;s chips. The cost of using AI, based on usage, could pile up for startups.

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