Artificial intelligence powerhouse Anthropic has spent the past year outpacing rivals on the technology front. Now, as it prepares to hit Wall Street, the scale of its public debut could be equally formidable. According to two people familiar with the discussions, Anthropic's investment banking team has indicated to potential investors that it plans to raise over $100 billion in its initial public offering. These sources noted that the IPO could value the company at an estimated $2 trillion.
If successful, the five-year-old company would complete the largest IPO in history, surpassing Elon Musk's SpaceX, which went public in June with a $1.77 trillion valuation and raised $85.7 billion. For Anthropic itself, this represents a major leap: the company was valued at $900 billion in a private funding round earlier this year and submitted its listing application in June. Anthropic has already begun early roadshows with potential investors, presenting its business performance and growth outlook while gauging market appetite for its shares.
Given the current political and economic uncertainty, this listing will test the market's acceptance of AI-related stocks. Since the AI boom began four years ago, Anthropic would become the second large language model AI lab to go public after SpaceX. OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, is also in talks with investors to pursue an IPO next year.
Founded in 2021 by CEO Dario Amodei and others who left OpenAI due to disagreements over the direction of AI development, Anthropic has long been viewed as a challenger to OpenAI. However, Amodei's team spent years developing AI programs capable of generating code, supporting long-form conversations, and automating business processes. Following the technological breakthrough of its coding chatbot Claude Code, the company's revenue surged dramatically. In May, Anthropic's valuation reached $900 billion, surpassing OpenAI's $730 billion to become the world's most valuable privately held startup.
One source indicated that when Anthropic secured this private valuation, the goal was always to go public at a significantly higher figure. In early roadshow presentations to potential investors, Anthropic executives stated that the company's AI model performance would continue to improve through iterative upgrades. They argued that even if competitors engage in price wars, the company can maintain a premium on its services. However, investors have raised questions: how will the company sustain high fees, and how will it address the challenge of open-weight models—which publicly expose underlying system computing parameters and often cost less than Anthropic's products?
People familiar with the negotiations reveal that Anthropic's investors believe the potential market for its services could reach trillions of dollars, eventually covering a wide range of white-collar work scenarios. Two investors familiar with the company indicate that as the listing process advances, a core highlight of Anthropic's pitch is its revenue growing more than tenfold year-over-year. But the key question remains whether Anthropic can secure sufficient AI computing resources—including data centers, chips, and energy—to meet demand for its products.
Anthropic is expected to disclose its IPO prospectus in the coming weeks and complete its listing within the next few months. Ahead of the offering, the company has already shared its latest financial data with investors. Four insiders say the startup's annualized revenue (monthly revenue extrapolated to a full-year basis) surpassed $65 billion last month, up from just $9 billion at the end of last year. One source added that Anthropic generated $11.6 billion in revenue in the second quarter. Media outlets have previously reported on Anthropic's $2 trillion valuation target, while Bloomberg was the first to disclose its annualized revenue figures.