Anthropic files for IPO as race with OpenAI heats up

Anthropic has confidentially filed for a US stock market listing, setting up what could become one of the biggest technology IPOs in history and intensifying its rivalry with OpenAI.

The Claude maker confirmed on Monday that it had submitted a draft registration statement on Form S-1 to the Securities and Exchange Commission, giving the company the option to go public once regulators complete their review.

“The proposed initial public offering will depend on market conditions and other factors,” Anthropic said in a statement.

The company did not disclose the size, timing or valuation of the offering.

The filing comes days after Anthropic raised $65bn (£48bn) in funding at a post-money valuation of $965bn, making it one of the world’s most valuable private companies and putting it ahead of OpenAI’s last reported valuation.

Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei alongside a group of former OpenAI researchers who left to build a rival focused on AI safety and enterprise adoption.

The company has rapidly emerged as OpenAI’s closest competitor, with its Claude models now widely used by businesses through partnerships with Amazon, Google and other cloud providers.

According to recent reports, Anthropic expects revenue to more than double this year and is targeting its first operating profit, helped by strong demand from enterprise customers.

Around 80 per cent of its revenue is understood to come from business products rather than consumer subscriptions.

Cloud giants fuel AI rivalry

The filing comes as Anthropic and OpenAI continue to compete for enterprise customers, cloud distribution and investor attention ahead of expected public market debuts.

Anthropic’s Claude models and OpenAI’s GPT models are sold to developers and corporate customers through cloud platforms run by Amazon, Microsoft and Google, giving both startups close financial ties to the world’s largest technology companies.

Those relationships have also raised questions over how revenue is reported. Anthropic is understood to recognise some cloud-platform sales on a gross basis, while OpenAI reports certain cloud sales on a net basis, making direct comparisons between the two companies more complicated.

Amazon and Google have both made major commitments to Anthropic, while Microsoft remains OpenAI’s most important backer.

The IPO process will give public market investors their first detailed look at Anthropic’s financials, including how quickly it is growing, how much it is spending on computing power and whether its enterprise-heavy revenue base can support a valuation close to $1 trillion.

The company said the number of shares to be offered and the price range have not yet been determined.