Pomegra
Amazon is negotiating a roughly $7B purchase of Israeli-founded Decart, an AI video and chip-portability startup, up 75% from its May $4B valuation.
Key Takeaways
- Amazon is in talks to buy Decart for about $7B, and no agreement has been signed.
- Decart was valued at about $4B in May 2026, after raising $300M in a round led by Radical Ventures.
- Anthropic reportedly walked away from a roughly $6B deal for Decart weeks earlier.
Lead
Amazon is in talks to acquire Decart, a San Francisco-based startup with Israeli roots, for about $7B, The Wall Street Journal reported on October 12, 2026. Talks are ongoing, and the report says a deal could be signed soon but could also collapse. If it closes, the purchase would rank among the largest exits in the history of Israeli technology.
Decart was founded in 2023 by Dean Leitersdorf, Orian Leitersdorf and Moshe Shalev. It has raised roughly $450M in total.
What Is Amazon Reportedly Paying for Decart?
Amazon is reportedly offering about $7B, though the structure, the split between cash and stock, and any retention terms are undisclosed. That figure is roughly 75% above the $4B valuation set in May 2026. It is more than double the $3.1B valuation from the $100M raise in August 2025.
The May round brought in $300M and was led by Radical Ventures. Nvidia, eBay Ventures, Adobe Ventures, Toyota Ventures, Atreides Management and Valor Equity Partners joined, alongside existing backers Sequoia Capital, Zeev Ventures and Benchmark. Angel investors included Andrej Karpathy.
Early investors would see a large markup within five months of the last round. Investors who bought in May at $4B would see a gain of about 75% if the deal closes at the reported price.
What Does Decart Actually Sell?
Decart sells software that lets AI models run across different chips without being rebuilt. Its main product is the Decart Optimization Stack, or DOS, which targets Nvidia GPUs, Google TPUs and Amazon's Trainium accelerators.
The company also builds models. Lucy edits live video in real time. Oasis generates interactive simulated environments, which are used to train robots and autonomous vehicles.
Amazon already works with Decart. AWS gave the startup early access to its Trainium3 chip in 2025, and Amazon became a strategic customer in May 2026 under a commercial agreement with a joint go-to-market arrangement.
Why Would Amazon Pay $7B for Decart?
Amazon appears to be buying chip portability, not video models. Its Trainium line competes with Nvidia, and Nvidia's CUDA software keeps most AI developers on Nvidia hardware. A tool that lets a model move onto Trainium with little rework cuts the cost of switching.
That makes this a strategic purchase rather than an acquihire. The Leitersdorf brothers and their engineering team come with the deal, but a $7B price implies Amazon wants the optimization stack and the customer relationships around it.
The risk is neutrality. DOS is valuable to customers partly because it works on rival silicon. Under Amazon ownership, Nvidia and Google users may question whether support for their chips will keep pace. The loss of that neutrality could erode part of what Amazon is paying for.
What Happened With Anthropic?
Anthropic had reportedly agreed to buy Decart for about $6B but walked away in September after due diligence. The reason has not been disclosed. Nvidia, already an investor, was also reported to be in advanced talks before higher offers surfaced.
The sequence suggests at least three large buyers wanted the same asset within a few months. Each bid was higher than the last, and each was well above the May valuation. A competitive process of that kind often sets the price, and Amazon's number may reflect the competition as much as Decart's revenue, which is undisclosed.
What Comes Next for the Deal?
The next step is a signed agreement, if one materializes. Terms would need to survive due diligence, which sank the Anthropic deal. A deal of this size could also draw antitrust scrutiny, given Amazon's position in cloud computing and its stake in the chip market.
If talks fail, Decart would remain independent at a $4B mark that now looks low against three separate bids. If they succeed, Trainium gets a software layer that Nvidia's rivals have lacked.
Outlook
Amazon's reported $7B approach values Decart at 75% above its May round and more than double its August 2025 mark. The strategic logic rests on making Amazon's chips easier to adopt, and the main risk is the loss of Decart's neutrality across chip vendors. Nothing is final, and the earlier Anthropic collapse shows how quickly a price can move after diligence.
