Why OpenAI & Anthropic are suddenly becoming AI Consultants — A Survival Move, Not a Strategy
This month, OpenAI launched its “Deployment Company” and Anthropic started a major services JV with Blackstone. Both are now pushing hard into AI consulting and embedding their engineers inside client companies basically copying the traditional Indian IT services playbook.
But let’s call it what it actually is:-
This is not a brilliant business strategy.
This is a survival move.
After years of nonstop hype (GenAI replacing jobs, Agents killing developers, AGI just around the corner), the reality in 2026 is hitting hard:-
-Billions of dollars in losses every year
-Compute & inference costs growing faster than revenue
-Free tiers subsidizing hundreds of millions of users
-Investor patience reaching its limit
The core business model is still broken. They are not yet profitable on their models, and nobody knows when (or if) they will be. So now they’re rushing into services and consulting to create immediate revenue, deeper client lock-in, and a better story for the next funding round.
Will this disrupt Indian IT giants?
Highly unlikely in the near future.
Indian tech companies have something these AI labs don’t:-
- 20 to 30+ years of deep trust with enterprises and banks
- Massive execution capability and domain expertise
- Strong existing relationships that no shiny new AI company can replace overnight
Banks and large enterprises are extremely cautious in 2026. They won’t rip out proven partners just because OpenAI or Anthropic now offers consulting. Many of the initial projects for these new services arms will anyway go to companies linked to their own investors.
Bottom line:
This move reveals the weakness, not the strength of frontier AI companies. It’s a desperate attempt to fix broken unit economics. Indian IT has a golden opportunity they already own the ground. Now they just need to aggressively own the AI implementation layer.
The game is evolving, but it’s far from over.
What are your thoughts?
Survival move or smart evolution?