Exclusive-OpenAI seeks to accelerate fundraising ahead of Anthropic IPO, sources say

By Echo Wang, Krystal Hu and Sabrina Valle

NEW YORK, Oct 19 (Reuters) - OpenAI is racing to secure investor commitments before rival Anthropic's expected public market debut in mid-November, in an unusually fast fundraising that could value the ChatGPT maker at over $1.4 trillion, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The rapid timetable reflects, in part, a desire to get ahead of Anthropic as the two frontier labs are increasingly tapping in to a similar investor base, the people said, adding that OpenAI wants to capitalize on its recent revenue growth after launching new models. SoftBank Group, Abu Dhabi-based MGX and other existing backers of OpenAI are in talks to join the round of about $30 billion, one of the people said. 

The acceleration underscores how closely the two AI developers are competing for capital as both pursue trillion-dollar price tags, amid growing concern about rising interest rates, significant volatility in technology stocks and rising scrutiny of AI valuations.

OpenAI held meetings with long-only funds and sovereign wealth funds last week while Anthropic was hosting its own investor day. OpenAI's funding round is expected to move faster than is typical for an offering of its size, the people said.  

Investors familiar with the company say OpenAI also needs capital to fund its substantial infrastructure commitments and bolster its balance sheet if a deterioration in the IPO markets further delays its planned 2027 listing. 

Though there is high demand for the shares of both companies, investors face the challenge of evaluating and allocating capital to two complex, competing offerings within days or weeks of each other. Some investors view OpenAI’s financing push as an effort to lock in capital from funds that might otherwise devote more of their resources to Anthropic’s IPO, the people said. 

OpenAI and SoftBank declined to comment. Anthropic and MGX did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

TRYING TO HEAD OFF COMPARISONS

OpenAI is pitching investors on growth that accelerated after the launch of its GPT-6 Astra model, saying it had reached $50 billion in annualized revenue and expecting that figure to rise to $70 billion by year-end, according to one of the people.

OpenAI has also cut prices on its cheaper models, which it said has boosted usage, and told investors it can further lower the price of AI models, the person added. 

Anthropic's annualized revenue reached roughly $65 billion by July, Reuters previously reported. Its quarterly revenue jumped to $16.8 billion in the third quarter from $11.6 billion in the second quarter this year, it told investors, but slowing month-to-month revenue growth has raised concerns among investors about its valuation.

OpenAI is seeking to complete the fundraising before Anthropic’s financial disclosures give investors a fuller picture of its business and invite comparisons between the two companies, one person said. 

The disclosures could prompt investors to press OpenAI Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar for more details about the company’s revenue growth and financial outlook, the person added. OpenAI records revenue on a net basis by subtracting partner shares upfront. It has accused Anthropic of inflating its revenue by counting  the full, gross value of contracts sold through third-party cloud providers. Anthropic told Reuters earlier that it follows established accounting practices.

"OpenAI could want to set its own valuation and not have to worry about a comp (comparison)," said Edward Best, co-chair of capital markets at Willkie Farr & Gallagher, who is not working on the deal and commented on a hypothetical basis. "It's really a two-horse race in terms of being public." 

OpenAI was last valued at $852 billion in March this year, after a record-breaking $122 billion funding round, including a commitment from Amazon.com, which agreed to invest up to $50 billion in the lab. 

The Financial Times previously reported some details of OpenAI’s potential fundraising.  

IPO PLANS HIT BY MARKET JITTERS

A number of companies preparing to go public have decided to wait until after Anthropic’s planned IPO, wary of competing for investor demand amid market volatility and a pullback in AI stocks, bankers and investors said. Some late-stage companies are also timing private fundraising rounds to avoid coinciding with Anthropic’s expected debut, the bankers and investors said.

Some existing and prospective Anthropic investors have argued for a valuation closer to $1.5 trillion for its market debut — instead of the desired $2 trillion — after the AI startup's third-quarter results fell short of expectations, Reuters reported last week.

The reassessment comes amid a choppy market since September, with volatility in oil prices, rising bond yields and growing concerns about AI safety weighing on investor appetite for technology stocks. Investors are also scrutinizing the cost of AI infrastructure, including the debt needed to finance the data centers powering the boom.

At the center of the latest concerns is cloud provider CoreWeave, whose shares and debt tumbled last week as investors scrutinized the nearly $50 billion in borrowings used to fund its rapid expansion. 

The uncertainty has disrupted what had been expected to be a busy autumn for IPOs, with companies reassessing their listing plans amid market volatility and concerns about valuations. Blackstone-backed AirTrunk REIT, Nvidia-backed Firmus and SoftBank-backed SB Energy have either pulled or paused their listings. 

Nuclear services company Holtec cited a "perfect storm," driven mainly by uncertainty around data-center demand, ​when it pulled its US listing last month.

Companies in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index, widely viewed as a proxy for AI-related semiconductor demand, have shed $1.6 trillion in less than two weeks, while AI infrastructure companies have come under particular pressure.

(Reporting by Echo Wang and Sabrina Valle in New York and Krystal Hu in San Francisco; Editing by Colin Barr and Matthew Lewis)