Microsoft unveils Maia 300 chip to reduce reliance on Nvidia
The third-generation in-house chip is set to handle most of Microsoft's AI inference from 2027.
Money#04
40%
more tokens per megawatt than leading GPU systems
Image: The Verge
40%more tokens per megawatt than leading GPU systems
The short version
- Microsoft announced its third-generation Maia in-house AI chip, designed to be the primary AI inference system for its products and services.
- Maia 300 is expected to deliver 40 percent more tokens per megawatt than leading GPU-based systems, according to Microsoft.
- Production rollout begins in 2027, with multi-gigawatt deployments planned from that year.
- The chip uses a chiplet architecture built on TSMC's N2P process node, separating compute, memory controller, and I/O functions.
Why it matters
The chip points to a move away from Nvidia and AMD hardware for Microsoft's own AI workloads. For developers, lower inference cost per token could shape how cloud AI services are priced and built.
“We expect Maia 300 to deliver 40 percent more tokens per megawatt compared to leading GPU-based systems”