Anthropic files confidentially for US IPO

Anthropic has confidentially filed for a U.S. initial public offering, moving the maker of the Claude chatbot into a high-stakes race with OpenAI and SpaceX for public-market capital as investors pour money into artificial intelligence.

The company said Monday it submitted a draft registration statement, known as a Form S-1, to the Securities and Exchange Commission. The filing will remain private while regulators review it. Anthropic did not disclose the number of shares it plans to sell or the expected price.

“This gives us the option to go public after the SEC completes its review,” the company said in a statement. “The proposed initial public offering will depend on market conditions and other factors.”

The filing comes days after Anthropic said it had raised $65 billion in new funding and reached a valuation of $965 billion, ahead of OpenAI, which NPR reported was valued at $852 billion after a March funding round. Al Jazeera reported that Anthropic said at the time it was making annualized revenue of $47 billion from selling its technology to people and organizations using Claude to write code and perform other work and personal tasks.

A public listing at close to $1 trillion would place Anthropic among the world’s most valuable companies. One source reported that such a debut would likely rank as the second- or third-largest IPO ever, behind SpaceX and Saudi Aramco. Al Jazeera reported that SpaceX is pursuing a $75 billion offering at a $1.75 trillion valuation.

The move also adds urgency to a wave of expected technology listings. SpaceX filed financial information in late May for an IPO, according to NPR, and OpenAI is widely reported to be preparing its own listing. Al Jazeera reported that OpenAI is preparing to confidentially file for a U.S. IPO in the coming weeks.

“We believe this represents an opening of the floodgates for the IPO market, which has been relatively dormant for a few years,” said Dan Ives, managing director at Wedbush. Wedbush analysts also wrote that the three expected listings have “turned into a race to reach public markets over the coming months.”

Anthropic was founded in 2021 by former OpenAI leaders and operates as a public benefit corporation. Its stated purpose under that structure is the “responsible development and maintenance of advanced AI for the long-term benefit of humanity.” Dario Amodei, Anthropic’s chief executive, is worth $7 billion, according to Forbes, one source reported.

Analysts said timing could matter because Anthropic, OpenAI and SpaceX are all seeking large amounts of capital. “OpenAI and Anthropic are in a race to go public before capital runs out,” said Gil Luria, an analyst at DA Davidson. “The other reason for Anthropic to try to beat OpenAI out to the public market is that they will get to set the agenda for how a frontier model reports financials and do so in a way that is favourable to their financial model.”

Luria also said the combined demand from SpaceX, OpenAI and Anthropic “will be so considerable that it is likely to create disruptions in the capital markets, so going early will be a great advantage.”

Scott Stevens, founder and CEO of Gray Peak Financial, told Al Jazeera that Anthropic’s rise has been rapid. “OpenAI was the poster child for growth, innovation, and leadership in the industry, and now you’ve seen Anthropic, for the first time, raise capital at a higher valuation than OpenAI, and their growth rate is much, much higher,” he said.

The potential IPO comes amid both enthusiasm and unease over AI. NPR reported that chip stocks and other companies tied to the AI supply chain have soared as firms such as Anthropic and OpenAI invest heavily in data centers, while recent polls show Americans remain wary of AI’s impact on daily life.