Now A Shoe Company Is Buying Up GPUs And Pivoting To AI
Allbirds, the struggling footwear company whose stock price declined approximately 50% over the past year, announced a dramatic strategic pivot toward artificial intelligence and GPU infrastructure. The company’s stock price surged more than 100% following the announcement.
Under the new plan, Allbirds sold its namesake brand and footwear assets to American Exchange Group. The company has rebranded to NewBird AI and will transition to AI compute infrastructure services. The company’s stated long-term vision is to become a “fully integrated GPU-as-a-service and AI-native cloud solutions provider.”
The pivot comes with significant financial backing, as NewBird AI has secured a $50 million investment from an institutional investor to support infrastructure development. While the company brings over a decade of operational history, details on how a former shoe manufacturer plans to compete in the competitive AI infrastructure market remain limited. The immediate stock surge reflects investor enthusiasm for the pivot, though questions persist about establishing credibility in the capital-intensive AI infrastructure sector.