Anthropic overtakes OpenAI in valuation battle, becomes world’s most valuable AI startup

Anthropic has overtaken rival OpenAI to become the world’s most valuable artificial intelligence startup after a $65 billion funding round that values the company at $965 billion, marking one of the most dramatic shifts yet in the global AI investment race.

The San Francisco-based firm, founded in 2021 by former OpenAI researchers including Dario Amodei, said the latest Series H round underscores surging demand for its Claude chatbot and enterprise AI tools, as global companies race to integrate generative AI into core operations.

The valuation puts Anthropic ahead of OpenAI, which was last valued at $852 billion post-money in March, sharpening competition between the two leading players in the generative AI space and marking a new phase in the so-called trillion-dollar race in artificial intelligence.

Record funding fuels compute-driven expansion

The $65 billion raise was led by investors including Altimeter Capital, Dragoneer, Greenoaks Capital and Sequoia Capital, alongside participation from Coatue and ICONIQ. Strategic infrastructure partners such as Amazon, Samsung, Micron Technology and SK Hynix also joined the round.

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Of the total, $15 billion came from previously committed investments from hyperscalers, including $5 billion from Amazon, underscoring the deepening tie between AI model developers and global cloud infrastructure providers.

Anthropic said the capital will be deployed to expand computing capacity, advance AI safety research and scale its Claude product suite amid what it described as “historic demand” for its services.

Revenue momentum and enterprise adoption surge

Alongside the funding announcement, Anthropic disclosed that its annualised revenue run rate has crossed $47 billion, driven largely by strong enterprise adoption of its AI coding tools, particularly Claude Code.

The company has faced capacity constraints in recent months, including usage limits during peak demand, reflecting the strain on compute infrastructure as adoption accelerates across industries.

AI rivalry enters new phase

The latest valuation milestone further escalates the rivalry between Anthropic and OpenAI, both of which are reportedly preparing for eventual public listings as they seek to finance massive computing requirements needed to train next-generation models.

While OpenAI’s ChatGPT triggered the global generative AI boom in 2022, Anthropic’s rapid rise over a shorter timeframe highlights how quickly capital and enterprise adoption have shifted toward competing platforms in the AI ecosystem.

The participation of major chipmakers and cloud partners reflects a broader structural shift in the AI industry, where access to semiconductors and compute power is becoming as critical as model innovation itself.

As demand for large language models grows, both companies are increasingly reliant on long-term infrastructure partnerships to secure the computing capacity required to sustain training and deployment at scale.

IPO ambitions on the horizon

Industry observers say both Anthropic and OpenAI are positioning themselves for potential public market debuts, which could rank among the largest IPOs in technology history. The timing remains uncertain, but investor pressure is mounting as valuations approach unprecedented levels.