Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei (Chance Yeh/Getty Images)

Anthropic in talks for funding at a valuation as high as $950 billion, which would make it bigger than OpenAI

An improbable, parabolic rise in valuation has rocketed Anthropic past the presumed leader, OpenAI.

5/13/26 12:06PM

OpenAI’s dominance in the generative-AI boom once seemed inevitable. As the first out of the gate with a usable generative-AI chatbot, ChatGPT gobbled up mindshare, securing its place as the de facto AI app that practically turned its name into a verb.

Everyone else was chasing OpenAI as it plowed ahead with plans to build massive data centers all over the world, and kept cranking out new models at an impressive pace. But hot on OpenAI’s tail was Anthropic, founded by a group of ex-OpenAI researchers, including its CEO, Dario Amodei.

Now, a once unthinkable threshold is on the verge of being crossed in the battle to dominate AI. The New York Times reports that Anthropic is in talks to raise between $30 billion and $50 billion with a staggering valuation of up to $950 billion. That amount — if finalized in the deal — would put Anthropic well ahead of OpenAI’s latest reported valuation of $825 billion.

Anthropic’s steady focus on productivity and coding skills has paid off. While OpenAI was distracted with side quests like web browsers and video apps like Sora, enterprise users fell in love with Claude Code. This is starting to show up in the data.

Today Ramp reports that for the first time, more business users are using Anthropic’s AI than OpenAI’s.

ANTHROPIC beats OpenAI in business adoption for the first time. per @tryramp data

Today's update of Ramp AI Index shows 34.4% of businesses using Anthropic versus 32.3% using OpenAI.

Adoption of Anthropic quadrupled over the last year, while OpenAI rose only 0.3%. pic.twitter.com/Hvdx4rQmYv
— Ara Kharazian (@arakharazian) May 13, 2026

The stumble comes at a perilous time for OpenAI, as its CEO, Sam Altman, took the stand again this week in a trial to decide a lawsuit filed by Elon Musk that could potentially fire Altman and OpenAI President Greg Brockman, as well as undo the company’s recent restructuring into a for-profit company.

The speed at which Anthropic’s valuation has skyrocketed is incredible. Just over a year ago, Anthropic was valued at $61.5 billion. If the valuation from today’s report holds, Anthropic’s value will have increased by more that 1,445% in a year.

Rani Molla1h

Alphabet sold $3.6 billion in Japanese yen bonds — a record for a foreign company — likely to help its AI capex binge

We now have the value for Alphabet’s Japanese yen bond raise — 576.5 billion yen, or $3.6 billion — and it’s a record for a foreign issuer in Japan. The deal was spread across seven tranches with maturities ranging from 3 to 40 years, allowing the company to lock in rates as low as 1.965%.

The latest deal comes on the heels of Alphabet’s massive US and European bond deals, where the company has tapped global markets for nearly $60 billion in fresh capital over the last few months. In a filing earlier this week, the search giant said it would use the proceeds for “general corporate purposes.” That likely means fueling its AI infrastructure build-out, which has pushed its projected 2026 capex bill to a staggering $190 billion.

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Rani Molla20h

Bloomberg: Relationship between OpenAI and Apple has deteriorated and legal action may be imminent

The two-year-old alliance between Apple and OpenAI has deteriorated, Bloomberg reports, with the AI giant now consulting legal counsel about issuing a potential breach of contract notice.

OpenAI executives allege that Apple failed to adequately integrate and promote ChatGPT on the iPhone, causing the AI firm to lose out on billions a year in subscriptions and hurt its brand, according to the report.

Meanwhile, Apple has expressed concerns over OpenAI’s privacy protection, and has been miffed that OpenAI has been working on its own hardware with former Apple design lead Jony Ive.

More recently, Apple, which has trailed its peers in developing AI, has decided to offer users their choice of AI models, rather than aligning exclusively with OpenAI’s.

Apple-OpenAI Relationship Frays, Setting Up Possible Legal Fight

Meanwhile, Apple has expressed concerns over OpenAI’s privacy protection, and has been miffed that OpenAI has been working on its own hardware with former Apple design lead Jony Ive.

More recently, Apple, which has trailed its peers in developing AI, has decided to offer users their choice of AI models, rather than aligning exclusively with OpenAI’s.

Jon Keegan21h

Report: Mythos is used to crack MacOS

Apple’s MacOS has long been considered to have some of the strongest cybersecurity protections in the industry.

But researchers using a preview release of Anthropic’s Mythos AI model were able to take control of a Mac, in a significant example of the unreleased AI model’s cyber capabilities, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.

It took two security researchers five days to pull off the feat, which chained together bugs to corrupt the Mac’s memory, per the report. The researchers told the Journal that human expertise was required to use Mythos, and it would not be able to execute the attack on its own. The researchers reportedly said some of the Mythos hype was “overblown.”

Apple said it was taking the bug report “very seriously” and has not yet issued a fix.

Apple’s Security Has Been Tough to Crack. Mythos Helped Find a Way In.

Apple said it was taking the bug report “very seriously” and has not yet issued a fix.

Jon Keegan22h

Survey: 70% of Americans don’t want data centers in their community

America loves a good boogeyman, and data centers have become one.

It was once easy for the hyperscalers to sidle up to state legislators, utility executives, and local officials with the promise of jobs and the high-tech glow of AI for their economically challenged areas without much local opposition.

But now the script has been flipped, and public opposition to data centers is starting to solidify. A new Gallup survey asked 1,000 Americans for their thoughts on data centers, the first such survey for the polling company. Among the findings:

70% of survey respondents opposed local construction of AI data centers.
Opposition to local data centers was much stronger than opposition to local nuclear power plants.
Dislike for data centers is bipartisan — majorities of both Democrats and Republicans were opposed to data centers, but more so for Democrats.
Among those opposed to data centers, the impact on the environment and energy usage were top concerns.

Local communities and state governments around the US have introduced bans or moratoriums on data center construction. Senators have also introduced similar legislation in Congress.

Last month, Maine Governor Janet Mills vetoed legislation that would have enacted the first statewide bill to pause data center construction.

7 in 10 Americans oppose data centers being built in their communities

70% of survey respondents opposed local construction of AI data centers.
Opposition to local data centers was much stronger than opposition to local nuclear power plants.
Dislike for data centers is bipartisan — majorities of both Democrats and Republicans were opposed to data centers, but more so for Democrats.
Among those opposed to data centers, the impact on the environment and energy usage were top concerns.