Thirty Billion, on Fast-Forward
OpenAI is in a hurry, and Anthropic’s IPO is the reason. According to Reuters, the ChatGPT maker is racing to secure investor commitments for a roughly $30 billion round that could value it at more than $1.4 trillion — before rival Anthropic’s expected mid-November market debut. Two people familiar with the matter told Reuters the timetable is unusually fast for a deal this size, and deliberately so: OpenAI wants to get ahead of Anthropic while both labs court the same investor base.
SoftBank Group, Abu Dhabi-based MGX, and other existing OpenAI backers are in talks to join, one person said. Neither company commented; Anthropic and MGX did not respond to Reuters’ requests.
The Accounting Fight OpenAI Wants to Dodge
The rush is not about whether the money is there — Reuters says demand for both companies’ shares is high. It is about what happens when Anthropic’s disclosures give investors a fuller picture of the business. One person told Reuters OpenAI wants to finish before those filings invite direct comparisons — the kind that would put chief financial officer Sarah Friar in the hot seat over revenue growth and outlook.
OpenAI is pitching investors on $50 billion in annualized revenue, rising to $70 billion by year-end, saying price cuts on cheaper models boosted usage. Anthropic told investors its third-quarter revenue hit $16.8 billion (up from $11.6 billion in the second quarter), though Reuters reported its annualized revenue had reached roughly $65 billion by July, with slowing month-to-month growth raising valuation questions. And a Financial Times report earlier this month found OpenAI’s own end-September annualized revenue was closer to $50 billion, not the $70 billion previously signaled — a gap its own investors traced to the two labs counting revenue differently.
That accounting dispute is the fight OpenAI wants to have on its own turf. OpenAI books revenue net, subtracting partner shares upfront — and has accused Anthropic of inflating its numbers by counting the full gross value of contracts sold through third-party cloud providers. Anthropic says it follows established accounting practices. Locking in a private $1.4 trillion price before a public rival’s filings re-open that argument is, as capital-markets lawyer Edward Best put it to Reuters, about setting “its own valuation and not having to worry about a comp.”
A Two-Horse Race for the Same Wallets
There is a simpler reason for the speed, too: the same money cannot be in two places at once. Investors face “the challenge of evaluating and allocating capital to two complex, competing offerings within days or weeks of each other,” Reuters reported — and some see OpenAI’s push as an effort to lock in funds that might otherwise flow to Anthropic’s IPO. Best called it “really a two-horse race in terms of being public.”
The scramble extends beyond the two labs: several companies have delayed IPOs to avoid competing with Anthropic’s debut, per Reuters, and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index shed $1.6 trillion in under two weeks. Even Anthropic’s own investors are cooling — some now argue for a $1.5 trillion debut instead of the $2 trillion the company wanted.
Why This Matters: the Price Before the Price
Every outlet is covering this as a $30 billion fundraise. The real story is the pricing race. OpenAI was last valued at $852 billion in March after a $122 billion round; a $1.4 trillion tag would be a 64% jump in seven months. Close before Anthropic’s prospectus lands, and OpenAI names its number before investors have a live, daily-traded alternative to measure it against.
And there is a warning buried in the rush. OpenAI told Reuters it needs the capital partly to fund heavy infrastructure commitments and to cushion its balance sheet if weak IPO markets push its own planned 2027 listing further out. The AI boom’s debt bill is coming due: CoreWeave’s shares and debt tumbled last week under scrutiny of nearly $50 billion in borrowings. A $30 billion round buys OpenAI time. What it cannot buy is immunity from the comparison it is racing to outrun.
Meanwhile in AI Tech: how Anthropic hit $16.8B in Q3 revenue ahead of its IPO, and the $20 billion gap in OpenAI’s revenue story.
