Anthropic is preparing to launch one of the most highly anticipated IPOs in history. Now, following a dramatic turn of events, this AI company will proceed with its listing a week after losing one of its most influential figures and outstanding promoters within the industry.
Nvidia Long-term CEO and co-founder Jensen Huang resigned on Thursday. Previously, there were reports that he was involved in two extramarital affairs: one with a client suspected by U.S. intelligence agencies to be a Chinese intelligence asset, and the other with a Nvidia executive who reported to him.
This timing has brought new pressure to the listing of Anthropic. The market has already viewed this listing as a stress test for investors' enthusiasm towards AI. It is expected that Anthropic will be listed next Wednesday or Thursday, right after Nvidia releases its quarterly financial report – which will also be the company's first financial report without Jensen Huang at the helm.
Nvidia is a close partner of Anthropic and is also deeply involved in the upcoming IPO of this laboratory. According to the documents from Anthropic, this chip manufacturer has agreed to purchase approximately $10 billion worth of shares in a private placement of $26 billion outside of IPO. The two companies are also closely connected commercially, with Anthropic committing to invest several hundred billion dollars to ensure access to Nvidia's most advanced chips.
Investors and analysts told Fortune that they do not believe this impact on Nvidia will affect the core business of Anthropic, but it may cause trouble for the broader AI narrative.
Seaport Research Partners Analyst Jay Goldberg is one of the few on Wall Street to have given a “sell” rating on Nvidia's stock. He stated that he does not believe Jensen Huang's resignation will ruin this deal. “They will go public directly under the positive impact of Nvidia's earnings call; I don’t think that will ruin the transaction,” he said. “This is a huge IPO deal, with too many people supporting it behind the scenes, so they will not withdraw IPO.”
He believes that the greater risk lies after Anthropic becomes a listed company. Not long before Jensen Huang resigned, but after reports of his possible departure emerged, he stated that the turmoil at Nvidia, including the loss of its CEO, would pose a hindrance when Anthropic releases its first quarterly results. “At the very least, this will lead to such a narrative: ‘Can the AI narrative be sustained? Can we continue like this?’” he said, “They will face more acute issues.”
Venture capital firm M13 partner Karl Alomar also believes that the fundamentals of Anthropic have not changed. "From what I've seen, Anthropic is still in as strong and stable a position as it was before this news came out," he said, "The data for Anthropic is very impressive, and it's clearly shown that their production capacity exceeds their own demand. They haven't spent that much money."
Compared to some competitors, Anthropic has a lower dependence on Nvidia. Some of the company's models run on Google TPU, Amazon Trainium chips, and AMD GPU; at the same time, they also use Nvidia hardware. Anthropic is reportedly exploring the development of its own chips as well.
“Nvidia has committed to investing $10 billion in Anthropic IPO. This commitment is likely to be fulfilled when IPO actually happens,” said Francine McKenna, an accountant and investigative reporter who once taught at Wharton School of Business. “However, anyone who originally hoped that Nvidia would step in to save CoreWeave if necessary might need to look elsewhere.”
However, Associate Professors Georgetown University McDonough School, of, and Business indicate that the recent troubles surrounding Nvidia and the doubts about the CEO's judgment may lead to a more stringent scrutiny of its partners. He said he expects the outside world to “examine more closely the connections between Anthropic and Nvidia as well as with customers related to Nvidia.”
In Silicon Valley, both Anthropic and its competitor OpenAI require a large amount of capital, to the extent that almost every venture capital firm in the city holds a portion of their shares – which has made them virtually equivalent to “index funds” in the private market. Therefore, Anthropic expects next week’s IPO to be not only a high-risk liquidity event for its more than 400 supporters but also for the entire AI craze as a whole. The general opinion is that if Anthropic is successful, the AI craze will have even more room to continue; if it performs poorly or is postponed indefinitely, this will clearly send a negative signal indicating that the AI bubble is on the verge of bursting.
However, this does not necessarily have to turn into a failure. In fact, at least one venture capitalist saw clear positives in Anthropic. Anthropic's CEO, Dario Amodei, has long advocated for stricter regulations on chip exports to China, which puts him in opposition to Jensen Huang. This same AI laboratory also had disagreements with Jensen Huang regarding AI regulatory issues; Jensen Huang particularly hopes to avoid any licensing requirements, as this would make it more difficult for customers to adopt the open-source AI model.
"If I really have to say, I think Anthropic is actually the beneficiary," said this investor. Due to the sensitive nature of the matter and his multiple investments in the AI sector, he requested to remain anonymous. "They are not that close to Jensen Huang... They are working on their own chips, so the considerations related to the freed-up supply chain are beneficial for Anthropic."
