IBM and Groq Join Forces to Accelerate Enterprise AI at Scale

IBM and Groq have entered into a strategic technology and go-to-market partnership designed to speed up the deployment of agentic AI across enterprise environments. The collaboration brings Groq’s high-performance inference platform, GroqCloud, directly into IBM’s watsonx Orchestrate, enabling faster automation for complex workflows in sectors including healthcare, government, finance, retail, and manufacturing.

IBM and Groq

The partnership will also enhance RedHat open-source vLLM technology with Groq’s custom LPU architecture, offering enterprises improved speed, cost efficiency, and performance when moving AI agents from pilots to full production. IBM Granite models are planned to be supported on GroqCloud as part of the initiative.

GroqCloud, built on a specialized Language Processing Unit, delivers more than 5X faster inference than traditional GPU systems, with consistently low latency even at global scale. This allows enterprises to deploy AI agents that can analyze and respond to high-volume, real-time queries — such as thousands of parallel patient inquiries in healthcare — with improved accuracy and reliability.

Rob Thomas, Senior Vice President, Software and Chief Commercial Officer at IBM, said the partnership reinforces IBM’s commitment to helping organizations successfully deploy AI with measurable business outcomes. “When enterprises go from experimentation to production, they must ensure complex workflows can be deployed successfully to guarantee high-quality experiences,” he said.

Jonathan Ross, CEO and Founder of Groq, said the companies are enabling AI to act instantly and learn continuously. “With Groq’s speed and IBM’s enterprise expertise, we’re making agentic AI real for business,” he noted. “This partnership is about transforming how enterprises work with AI and accelerating adoption with confidence.”

The collaboration focuses on delivering high-speed inference, enhanced security and privacy controls for regulated industries, and seamless integration with watsonx Orchestrate for flexible, purpose-built automation patterns. Developers will gain new capabilities in inference orchestration, hardware acceleration, and load balancing — all within familiar tooling environments.

IBM will begin offering access to GroqCloud immediately as the companies move jointly to empower enterprises with faster, more intelligent, and operationally viable AI deployments globally.