In the fierce competition of the AI race, Anthropic has shown signs of overtaking OpenAI. According to reports, the company is considering raising tens of billions of dollars this summer to massively expand its computing capacity, which would bring its valuation to nearly $1 trillion. In comparison, OpenAI just completed a record-breaking $122 billion funding round in March of this year at an $852 billion valuation. Sources say that with continued revenue growth, Anthropic has attracted interest from investors such as Dragoneer, General Catalyst, and Lightspeed Venture Partners. This funding round could raise as much as $50 billion, and the transaction may be completed within two months.
Anthropic announced last month that its annualized revenue had exceeded $30 billion, a significant increase from $9 billion at the end of 2025. Driven by this rapid performance growth, Anthropic’s valuation has also risen dramatically: $183 billion in Series F in September 2025, $380 billion in Series G in February 2026, and the latest on-chain pre-IPO trading data shows its implied valuation has soared to $1.2 trillion. If the IPO is successfully completed at this valuation, the company would directly become the 11th largest publicly traded company in the world. As a major competitor, OpenAI also plans to launch its IPO in the second half of 2026. However, Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO is currently blocking the latter at a critical juncture just before its IPO. Coupled with OpenAI’s failure to meet user growth and sales targets, its path to going public may face obstacles.
Despite strong growth momentum, analysts point out that Anthropic’s growth narrative still has three clear potential risks. The first is customer concentration risk. In addition to the two major shareholders, Amazon (AMZN) and Google (GOOG), contributing over 20% of revenue, the company has committed to purchasing up to $30 billion in Azure computing power from Microsoft and over $100 billion in AWS computing power from Amazon over the next ten years. If core cloud vendors raise prices or supply fluctuates, gross margins could be impacted. The second is its unique governance structure. Anthropic adopts a Public Benefit Corporation (PBC) structure, with its core governance mechanism being a “Long-Term Benefit Trust” that holds special Class T shares, which have the right to elect a majority of the board members. Even after going public, strategic decisions will prioritize “long-term human benefit” over shareholder returns, potentially leading to profits being sacrificed for ethical considerations, and investors’ voting rights and economic returns will be limited. The third is excessive valuation premium. Based on a target valuation of $900 billion and annualized revenue of approximately $44 billion, its price-to-sales ratio is about 20x, far above the SaaS industry average of 8-12x. To support its current valuation, Anthropic would need to maintain a growth rate of at least 50% per year over the next three years.
