In one move, Anthropic has put OpenAI behind it on paper. The $65 billion in new money puts the makers of Claude at a post-money $965 billion. They say the funds are for more compute and to put their products in front of the kind of enterprise customers who are now opening up their wallets in every sector.
Why this round changes the board
It’s the first time you can put a higher price on Anthropic than on OpenAI, which was sitting at $852 billion back in March. And they put this deal together in a few weeks, which tells you there is no shortage of interest from investors as companies get on board with Claude.
You have Altimeter, Dragoneer, Greenoaks and Sequoia leading the way, with D.E. Shaw, Blackstone and DST Global in on it as well. Since the $30 billion Series G in February that had them at $380 billion, Anthropic says the word on the street from the enterprise side has been very positive.
The numbers: cloud, compute and where the money is coming from
Part of the $65 billion is $15 billion from hyperscalers we already knew about, $5 billion of it from Amazon. Back in April, Amazon made it known it would put in as much as $25 billion. In return, the startup is to put over $100 billion into Amazon’s cloud over the next decade. This is on top of the $8 billion they’ve put in already.
As for the bottom line, run-rate revenue hit $47 billion earlier this month. They’re looking at $10.9 billion for the second quarter – more than double what they did in the last one – and could be in the black for the first time. Some in the know say by the end of next month you’ll see an annualised rate of over $50 billion, a far cry from the $4 billion they were at in July of last year.
By the numbers
What the market is making of it:
– $65 billion for the Series H
– A $965 billion post-money tag
– OpenAI was at $852 billion in March
– $15 billion from committed hyperscaler deals
– $5 billion of that is from Amazon
– Amazon is set to invest as much as $25 billion
– $8 billion from before
– Over $100 billion in cloud spend down the road
– Run-rate is past $47 billion
– Q2 should bring in $10.9 billion
– ARR to be over $50 billion by next month’s end
– Where they were in July: $4 billion
How the competition is being redefined
This kind of valuation does a number on the status quo. It gives Anthropic the means to make a play against OpenAI in coding, security and the like. As a 2021 offshoot of some ex-OpenAI staff, they have made a name for themselves with the kind of firms that want an AI assistant they can trust.
They were in talks for a $900 billion-plus figure in late April after some proposals came in, but didn’t start the real work until this month. With both of them likely to go public come fall, there is only so much room for error when it comes to putting up the numbers.
What it means for the rest of us
If you are an enterprise buyer, you can expect to see better models and a more robust product line as they put this capital to work. It also shows you can’t do this without the cloud; the hyperscalers are now part of the equation for any serious AI vendor.
For the other side, it’s a steeper hill to climb for headcount, GPUs and a way to market. Anthropic will tell you they have seen a lot of uptake in the enterprise, and with the way their revenue is climbing, they are building a moat around platforms that can be safe, performant and not break the bank.
Looking ahead
The question is how they put the money to use on compute and turn a trial into a contract. If they can deliver on that $10.9 billion for the quarter and show a profit, it will make for a good story when they list.
OpenAI at $852 billion, Anthropic at $965 billion. The talk of valuations is over; now it’s about who can put out the kind of efficient, no-nonsense AI that a business will make a standard part of its operation.
