Anthropic’s IPO prospectus shows sweeping AI vision, surging costs

Anthropic, the five-year-old AI startup, is set to make a splash with its anticipated IPO, projecting a valuation more than double its May estimate of US$965 billion. The company's IPO prospectus, revealed to Reuters, outlines an ambitious vision of AI's potential to redefine the global economy, surpassing the transformative impacts of industrialization, electricity, and the internet.

However, this vision comes with a hefty price tag. In 2025, Anthropic reported a staggering net loss of US$42 billion, with projected spending of US$518 billion on cloud, computing, and infrastructure in the coming year. Despite these losses, revenue surged twofold to nearly US$4.6 billion, though the company incurred operating losses of over US$8 billion, excluding certain liabilities.

The IPO, which could value Anthropic at over US$2 trillion, aims to capitalize on the rapid growth of this relatively new AI laboratory, establishing it as a benchmark for Wall Street's valuation of leading AI companies, including its rival, OpenAI. As the company navigates concerns about the potentially harmful behavior of increasingly autonomous AI models, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has called for a cautious approach to AI development.

The company's aggressive compute and infrastructure spending, up threefold from the previous year, is a testament to its pursuit of this bold vision. Meanwhile, its biggest competitor, OpenAI, is also preparing for its IPO, expected to launch by early 2027. Anthropic's IPO is expected to launch after the November US midterm elections and could set a new precedent for valuing AI-driven companies.