Table of Contents
Former Google chief executive Eric Schmidt owns about 1% of Anthropic, a stake that could be worth up to $20 billion if the artificial intelligence company goes public at a valuation of $2 trillion, Bloomberg News reported on Monday, citing people familiar with the matter.
Schmidt put tens of millions of dollars into Anthropic’s Series A round in 2021, when PitchBook valued the company at $461 million. Anthropic raised $65 billion in May at a post-money valuation of $965 billion, at which 1% is worth about $9.65 billion. Investors indicated last week that a fair IPO valuation could be $1.8 trillion to $2 trillion, Bloomberg reported.
Reuters reported last week that some investors discussed about $1.5 trillion at a recent meeting, below earlier expectations of roughly $2 trillion. By simple arithmetic, 1% would be worth $15 billion at $1.5 trillion and $18 billion at $1.8 trillion. The IPO valuation has not been set.
It is unclear whether Schmidt has sold any of his stake since, Bloomberg said. Schmidt and Anthropic declined to comment.
Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index puts Schmidt’s net worth at $57.5 billion. At a $2 trillion valuation it could approach $80 billion, about a third higher. Schmidt led Google as chief executive from 2001 to 2011 and later served as executive chairman of its parent, Alphabet, until January 2018. He has since invested in hundreds of startups, including Mistral AI, Reflection AI and World Labs, according to Chosun. The Anthropic stake would be his biggest investment success since an early stake in Uber in 2011, the newspaper reported.
A valuation of $2 trillion would be more than 4,300 times the 2021 Series A figure, but that multiple is the company’s, not Schmidt’s. At 2021 prices, a check of tens of millions of dollars would have bought several percent of the company, so his current 1% reflects dilution from later funding rounds, and his own return is lower than the valuation multiple.
Bloomberg also reported that Anthropic’s seven co-founders are each worth about $8 billion at the latest valuation. The company plans to begin formal IPO marketing as early as the week of Nov. 9 and aims to list before Thanksgiving, which falls on Nov. 26. In an IPO prospectus seen by Reuters in September, Anthropic said AI will transform the global economy more profoundly than industrialization, electricity or the internet.
The figures remain projections. Each $100 billion of IPO valuation adds about $1 billion to a 1% stake, so where the offering prices will decide whether Schmidt’s gain lands nearer $15 billion or $20 billion.
The intelligence satisfies curiosity. The paid briefings satisfy strategy.
Every Monday, Elite subscribers receive an Investor Memo breaking down the deal, the structure and the positioning behind the week's most consequential African wealth story — the kind of analysis that doesn't appear anywhere else.
Twice a month, a Wealth Intelligence brief profiles a single billionaire's holdings, cash flows and expansion pipeline in detail no public source matches.
→ Executive ($25/mo): Daily newsletter + Deep-Dive Reports
→ Elite ($75/mo): Everything above + Investor Memos + Wealth Intelligence + Quarterly Analyst Briefings
Subscribe now
