Eric Schmidt's early bet on Anthropic, the AI company behind the Claude chatbot, could be worth as much as $20 billion when the startup goes public, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
The former Google chief executive put tens of millions of dollars into Anthropic's 2021 Series A round, when PitchBook valued the company at roughly $461 million, and now holds about 1% of the company.
Investors have recently discussed an IPO valuation of between $1.8 trillion and $2 trillion for Anthropic, up from its most recent private valuation of $965 billion, a figure that would already put Schmidt's stake at close to $10 billion on paper.
Starting pistol
Anthropic could begin marketing the IPO to investors as soon as the week of 9 November, with shares potentially trading before Thanksgiving.
The company's rise has been rapid: it raised $30 billion at a $380 billion valuation in a Series G round in February, reporting annualized revenue of $14 billion, then raised $65 billion at a $965 billion valuation in a Series H round in May, with annualized revenue above $47 billion.
That May round drew more than $2 billion each from Altimeter Capital, Dragoneer, Greenoaks and Sequoia Capital, pushing Anthropic's valuation past rival OpenAI's.
A $2 trillion debut would put Anthropic's Innovation Endeavors-style return ahead of its early Uber bet, whose valuation grew roughly 1,400-fold to $82 billion by its 2019 listing.
Wealth creator
Schmidt's fortune, estimated by Bloomberg's Billionaires Index at $57.5 billion, could approach $80 billion on paper at a $2 trillion valuation.
Anthropic's co-founders are each worth an estimated $8 billion on paper, according to the same index.
Schmidt and Anthropic declined to comment to Bloomberg, which said it could not confirm whether he had sold any shares since his initial investment.
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