90 venture capital firms and other money managers have invested in both OpenAI and Anthropic, a WIRED analysis of PitchBook data found. That overlap helps explain why many backers aren't picking sides even as both labs move toward public markets. Anthropic filed a confidential S‑1 on June 1 after a late-May financing that the brief identifies as a $65 billion round at a reported post-money valuation of $965 billion, and OpenAI is reported to be preparing its own confidential filing. Roughly 42 percent of OpenAI’s listed investors appear on Anthropic’s cap table, a crossover that investors and academics say looks deliberate rather than accidental. The next public milestones will be audited financial disclosures and any formal roadshows, events that will decide which company frames frontier AI.

42 percent is the share of OpenAI’s listed investors that overlap with Anthropic, according to the WIRED analysis of PitchBook data that counted roughly 90 firms with stakes in both companies. The list of common backers is heavy with familiar names: Sequoia Capital, Greylock, Founders Fund, Redpoint Ventures, Emerson Collective and Sound Ventures all appear on both cap tables. That degree of duplication is unusually large for firms competing directly for customers, talent and regulatory attention.

Why investors are doubling down on both bets

Investors describe the pattern as portfolio protection rather than a quiet endorsement of one technology or team. Harvard Business School professor Tom Nicholas told WIRED that the mix of backers suggests few believe the market will be purely winner-take-all. Kyle Stanford, director of venture capital research at PitchBook, also told WIRED that stakes in both companies let investors protect their ability to generate returns instead of signaling allegiance to one technical approach.

Those motives help explain how the same limited partners and venture firms ended up backing two firms that have publicly clashed over hires, policy and customers. For limited partners managing pools of capital, the logic is simple: backing both reduces the downside if one architecture or go-to-market strategy loses. For venture firms, it preserves optionality, enabling participation in whichever company outperforms when the market values audited revenue and profit streams.

That dynamic also reshapes how analysts and bankers will value each firm. Market intelligence cited by NDTV and attributed to a Deutsche Bank Research Institute note compared revenue runs for the two labs, putting Anthropic on track for about $40 billion in annualized recurring revenue and OpenAI at about $30 billion. Those estimates, however provisional, are already part of the framing that will shape investor appetite once audited results are public.

The two companies’ moves toward public markets recast their rivalry as a test for Wall Street. Anthropic completed its late-May capital round and then filed a confidential registration statement with U.S. regulators on June 1, Reuters reported.

Mastheads

The confidential S-1 didn't disclose the size or terms of any offering, and the filing lets Anthropic advance IPO preparations while delaying public disclosure of audited financial detail.

Going first can create a narrative advantage, but it also means taking on disclosure risk. Harrison Rolfes, a senior analyst at PitchBook, told Reuters that Anthropic’s confidential filing may have given it the early narrative edge. He added, though, that the conventional wisdom can flip: by filing first Anthropic has "volunteered to absorb all the disclosure risk first," leaving OpenAI the option to watch how investors react and calibrate its own messaging and offering.

OpenAI’s public comments have been measured. CEO Sam Altman told CNBC that he isn't focused on the timing of an IPO and that the company will go public "when it makes sense," remarks that were reported after Anthropic’s filing. Business Insider and other reporting have said OpenAI has been preparing a confidential filing as well, and both firms will likely pursue public listings this year.

For bankers and institutional investors, the filings will force a closer look at the hard numbers behind each firm’s growth story. A Deutsche Bank note, cited by NDTV, suggested OpenAI could still pursue a very large offering, and some reporting has discussed the possibility of a multi-decade-defining IPO for the ChatGPT maker. That language speaks to expectation and ambition, not audited reality; roadshows and the S-1 schedules will convert those narratives into price discovery or, in some cases, disappointment.

The overlap in backers also has practical consequences in the run-up to any public sale. Shared investors can smooth primary-market activity if they tilt toward one company at pricing, but they can also complicate allocations and aftermarket behaviour. Limited partners with exposure to both firms will face decisions about secondary sales, voting and future follow-on rounds that could influence how aggressively either firm prices an offering.

Analysts note another wrinkle: confidentiality lets a filer refine its story while the other watches. If OpenAI waits, it can observe investor reaction to Anthropic’s disclosures and adjust both numbers and narrative.

If Anthropic’s figures meet or exceed market hopes, that could pressure OpenAI to be bolder in offering size or valuation. Meanwhile if they disappoint, Anthropic will have taken the first public hit.

What plays out in the weeks ahead won't be just which company set a price or a valuation. It will be how public investors parse revenue runs, margin profiles and the sustainability of AI demand. That parsing will decide whether the market rewards scale, differentiation, partnerships or something else altogether.

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Anthropic filed its confidential S-1 on June 1; public disclosure of audited results and any formal roadshows will determine which firm sets Wall Street’s price for frontier AI. Originally reported by Reuters.

This article was created with AI assistance.