Google has decided to invest another billion into Anthropic, four sources told the Financial Times, bringing its total sunk cost to more than three billion dollars. Both companies have declined to comment. Google uses Anthropic’s Claude AI models on Vertex AI, an AI-powered development platform.
Amazon has also invested four billion into Anthropic to integrate its Claude AI models into the next generation of Alexa speakers. Other sources say Anthropic is also in talks with Lightspeed Venture Partners to raise another two billion. This investment would make Anthropic worth 60 billion. Even so, investors don’t believe that Anthropic or its rivals will be profitable soon due to the extreme costs of developing AI models.
Google invented transformers, a type of neural network that became a backbone technology for AI models, back in 2017. Despite some success with models like Gemini, Imagen, Chirp, Veo and more, Google doesn’t have as significant a foothold in the generative AI market.
Having so many big tech companies backing AI start-ups alarmed the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which investigated Google parent Alphabet’s first $2.3 billion investment in Anthropic. However, as the Financial Times notes, FTC commissioner Lina Khan, who had a reputation as an aggressive antitrust enforcer, has since stepped down from her post at the head of the agency as the Trump regime took power, which could mean similar deals might not receive the same scrutiny in the future.
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