Bloomberg
Anthropic PBC raised US$65 billion in a funding round that valued the artificial intelligence (AI) company at US$965 billion including the new investment, eclipsing rival OpenAI’s value for the first time.
The funding, announced on Thursday, was led by Altimeter Capital, Dragoneer, Greenoaks and Sequoia Capital. Each of the lead investors put in more than US$2 billion, according to people familiar with the matter. Sequoia declined to comment. The other three firms did not respond to a request for comment.
Alphabet Inc’s Google contributed several billion dollars to the round as part of a previously announced commitment to invest up to US$40 billion in Anthropic over time, according to people familiar with the matter. Amazon.com Inc invested US$5 billion in the round, also as part of a prior commitment, Anthropic said in a blog post.
A smartphone displaying the logo of the US artificial intelligence safety and research company Anthropic is pictured on Thursday last week.
Photo: AFP
Google declined to comment. Micron Technology Inc, Samsung Electronics Co and SK Hynix Inc also contributed an undisclosed amount, helping to push the round well above Anthropic’s initial US$30 billion target.
The large round came together in a matter of weeks, a sign of strong investor demand for the Claude maker. In late April, Anthropic had been weighing whether to pursue new financing at a more than US$900 billion valuation after receiving several inbound proposals. The AI start-up then kicked off advanced discussions earlier this month.
Founded in 2021 by a group of former OpenAI employees, Anthropic has since emerged as a leader in the AI sector. Anthropic has developed a series of AI tools aimed at overhauling the way businesses handle tasks from coding to cybersecurity. Anthropic and OpenAI are expected to go public as soon as this fall and Anthropic is still expected to proceed with an IPO on that timeline after the latest funding, one person said.
Anthropic declined to comment.
Anthropic expects to post US$10.9 billion in revenue for the second quarter, more than doubling from the prior three-month period as demand surges for its AI software. The company is also on pace for its first profitable quarter.
The company has told investors that its annualized run rate revenue would surpass US$50 billion by the end of next month, people familiar with the matter said. Anthropic’s run rate, a metric that projects full-year revenue based on sales from a shorter period, was US$4 billion in July of last year.
OpenAI was valued at US$852 billion in a funding round completed in March. The company is expected to confidentially file draft paperwork to go public in the coming days or weeks.