Anthropic overtakes AI as the world’s most valuable AI startup

Anthropic just became the world’s most valuable AI startup. The Claude maker raised USD 65 bn in a Series H round on Thursday, valuing the company at a whopping USD 965 bn, nearly triple the USD 380 bn valuation it held back in February. The new valuation helped the company edge past rival OpenAI, last valued at USD 852 bn in March.

Who’s in? The round was led by Atimeter Capital, Dragoneer, Greenoaks and Sequoia Capital, with Coatue and Iconiq among the co-leads. Participants included Abu Dhabi’s MGX and Singapore’s Tenasek, as well as Capital Group, D1 Capital Partners, Baillie Gifford, Blackstone, Brookfield, D.E. Shaw Ventures, DST Global and Fidelity.

What’s the money for? Lots of compute, to meet what CFO Krishna Rao called a “historic demand,” after it struggled with capacity issues and resorted to capping usage during peak hours. The company also says the cash will go towards safety and interpretability research, and scaling the products customers rely on.

Follow the revenue: Anthropic says its run-rate revenue — a favorite metric for startups that calculates annual performance based on recent results — crossed USD 47 bn this month, up from USD 30 bn earlier this year and USD 10 bn in actual revenue last year. The numbers helped stoke the demand, as Anthropic had initially gone out targeting to raise just USD 30 bn from financial institutions, according to the Financial Times.

Alongside the financial backers, three of the world's biggest memory-chip makers — Samsung, Micron and SK Hynix — joined the round as strategic partners. The round also folds in USD 15 bn of previously committed money from cloud hyperscalers, including USD 5 bn from Amazon, which said in April it would put up to USD 25 bn into the company in exchange for a USD 100 bn-plus, decade-long commitment to its cloud.

Looking bubbly? The loops where the same names are showing up as buyers, sellers and shareholders are becoming a defining feature of the AI build-out, stoking fears the sector looks like a bubble waiting to burst.

Why it matters: This is likely Anthropic’s last private round before an IPO that could reportedly come as soon as this year. OpenAI, which last raised a record USD 122 bn, is preparing to file confidentially and could list as soon as September, while Elon Musk's SpaceX (now merged with xAI) published its prospectus last week and is reportedly targeting a USD 2 tn valuation while seeking over USD 75 bn.

The raise landed the same day Anthropic released Claude Opus 4.8, its newest flagship, pitched as better at agentic tasks and coding and notably more “honest.” Then there's Mythos, the cybersecurity model Anthropic has kept on a very short leash, and was described by tech pundits as uncannily good at finding and exploiting hidden flaws in software. Anthropic says a wider release is coming “in the coming weeks.”

Anthropic’s reach now extends beyond the tech landscape. Cofounder Chris Olah was invited to speak next to Pope Leo XIV in the Vatican last week on safeguarding humans in the age of AI. Olah had some stark notes, saying that AI could displace human labor on a vast scale, and the gains will be concentrated in a handful of rich nations, with no mechanism to share them yet.

THE CLOSING BELL: TADAWUL-

The TASI rose 0.4% on Thursday, 21 May on turnover of SAR 11.1 bn. The index is up 5.1% YTD.

In the green: Kingdom Holding (+8.3%), Emaar The Economic City (+7.1%), and Tihama Advertising (+7.0%).

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THE CLOSING BELL: NOMU-

The NomuC rose 0.6% on Thursday, 21 May on turnover of SAR 25.3 mn. The index is down 1.7% YTD.

In the green: Paper Home (+9.4%), Wajd Life Trading (+8.0%), and Rawasi Albina Investment (+7.8%).

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