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Former Google CEO Schmidt holds about 1% stake in Anthropic; valuation could reach $2 trillion if it goes public
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Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter, reported that former Google CEO Eric Schmidt holds about a 1% stake in AI startup Anthropic because of an early investment. As Anthropic is about to launch an IPO, he is expected to become one of the individual investors who profit most from the company’s listing.
Schmidt, now 71, first invested in Anthropic in 2021, when the company was valued at $461 million. The sources said he put tens of millions of dollars into the Series A round; it is not yet clear whether he has sold any shares. Anthropic’s IPO is expected to generate enormous wealth for employees and investors.
Based on the valuation from its last funding round, each of Anthropic’s seven co-founders is already worth $8 billion and has joined the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Investors said last week that a reasonable valuation for the company is between $1.8 trillion and $2 trillion. At the upper end of that range, Anthropic’s valuation would be more than 4,300 times what it was in its Series A round.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, at a $2 trillion valuation, Schmidt’s Anthropic stake would increase his net worth by about one-third, to nearly $80 billion. Even at the most recent $965 billion valuation, his wealth would rise by nearly $10 billion from its current $57.5 billion.
Over the past 15 years, Schmidt has made technology investments through TomorrowVentures, Innovation Endeavors and his family office Hillspire. PitchBook data shows that Hillspire is associated with hundreds of venture investments. Its early portfolio was concentrated in consumer internet, software and fintech; in recent years, AI has become a key focus, and it has invested in Mistral AI, Reflection AI, World Labs and Anthropic.
If Anthropic lists at a $2 trillion valuation, Schmidt’s return on his investment in the company would exceed Innovation Endeavors’ early investment in Uber in 2011. When Uber went public in 2019, its valuation had grown about 1,400 times, to $82 billion.
People familiar with the matter said this month that Anthropic could start its IPO roadshow as early as the week of Nov. 9, plans to begin trading before the Thanksgiving holiday and is expected to list by the end of this year at the latest. Other major investors include Alphabet, Amazon, Nvidia and Microsoft. Altimeter Capital, Dragoon, Greenoaks and Sequoia Capital also invested more than $2 billion in a round they led in May this year; the round reached $65 billion and valued Anthropic at $965 billion, marking the first time it surpassed OpenAI. The people also said the size of this IPO is expected to match or exceed the $1.77 trillion record set by SpaceX in June.
