Amazon warehouses GPUs due to power limits

Business Insider reported that Amazon has a large inventory of GB300 Blackwell-series GPUs sitting in warehouses because it lacks the power to turn them on, with at least one AWS team lacking a clear forecast for rack installation. An Amazon spokesperson stated that staging hardware ahead of construction is routine business practice to secure scarce GPUs. Critics have interpreted this as Nvidia channel stuffing or forcing sales to realize revenue, suggesting fake demand. However, the analysis argues the more likely explanation is a shortage of powered-up data centers rather than a lack of AI demand. GPUs are currently priced at a premium, with old hardware selling above original cost, and Amazon is not expected to order tens of billions of dollars in chips if the plan is to warehouse them indefinitely. The situation is distinct from the dot-com era's dark fiber issue, which involved excess installed infrastructure with too little demand, whereas the current situation involves too little infrastructure to service high demand.