Anthropic considers funding round that could value it near $1tn

In short: Anthropic is considering raising up to $50bn in a new funding round that could value the company at about $900bn before the new money.

What happened

Anthropic, the company behind the Claude AI assistant, is weighing a large funding round this summer, according to the Financial Times. People familiar with the talks said the round could raise as much as $50bn and value Anthropic at about $900bn “pre-money” (the value before the new investment is added).

Anthropic was valued at $380bn in February, the report said. Investors mentioned as showing interest include Dragoneer, General Catalyst, and Lightspeed Venture Partners.

The report also says Anthropic’s annualised revenue, which is an estimate based on recent weeks, could soon pass $45bn. That would be up from about $9bn at the end of last year.

Anthropic is looking to build more “computing capacity,” which is the hardware and data center time needed to run AI systems (like renting more ovens to bake more loaves at once). The company has faced limits that have affected its ability to serve customers in recent weeks, according to the report.

The company has also been making deals with SpaceX, Google, Broadcom, and AWS to secure more long-term computing supply. A wider release of a newer AI model called Mythos is expected to increase its need for computing power.

Why it matters

Big AI tools can get popular fast, but they are expensive to run. If Anthropic raises this much money, it could help the company handle demand from businesses and speed up the release of new products, and it could shift the balance of power among the biggest AI companies.

Source: Financial Times