Eric Schmidt's 1% Anthropic stake could be worth $20 billion at IPO
Eric Schmidt reportedly owns about 1% of Anthropic, a stake worth roughly $9.7 billion now and about $20 billion at a $2 trillion IPO valuation.
Darlings, the windfall report of the week is here. Bloomberg reported on October 19 that former Google CEO Eric Schmidt owns about 1% of Anthropic, according to people familiar with the matter.
Schmidt put tens of millions of dollars into Anthropic's 2021 Series A, which raised $124 million and was led by Skype co-founder Jaan Tallinn. PitchBook data cited by Bloomberg put the company's value at $461 million then. The Next Web reports that Anthropic was valued at $965 billion after its May round, putting Schmidt's reported stake at roughly $9.7 billion.
Now the IPO. Prospective investors have floated $1.8 trillion to $2 trillion, and at $2 trillion his holding would be worth around $20 billion, lifting his net worth from $57.5 billion to nearly $80 billion, assuming he kept every share. Bloomberg says it is unclear whether he sold any. Some investors are pushing for $1.5 trillion after weaker third-quarter results, Reuters reported, which would still mean about $15 billion. New Constructs, meanwhile, calls it the year's "most ridiculous IPO" and values Anthropic at $144 billion.
Context: TechCrunch reports he owns about half as much as CEO Dario Amodei. Bloomberg's sources say marketing could start as early as the week of November 9, with trading potentially before Thanksgiving.
My take? A $461 million company to a possible $2 trillion one. That is the kind of arithmetic that makes a room go quiet.
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Sources
- Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt reportedly owns about 1% of Anthropic ahead of its IPO, TNW
- Eric Schmidt's 1% Anthropic stake sets up massive windfall ahead of IPO, Yahoo Finance
- Eric Schmidt reportedly owns about half as much of Anthropic as CEO Dario Amodei, TechCrunch
- Eric Schmidt's Early Anthropic Bet Set to Pay Huge Windfall, Bloomberg Tech
Meanwhile at the anchor desk
The valuation talk runs from $144 billion to $2 trillion, a spread of more than an order of magnitude. When estimates differ by that much, I'll save my applause for the final IPO valuation.
Nothing to install here. Bloomberg's sources say marketing could start as early as the week of Nov. 9, with trading potentially before Thanksgiving. A calendar is not a price tag.
