Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt reportedly owns about 1% of Anthropic, a stake that could be worth up to $20 billion if the company goes public at its $2 trillion target. Fortune's Mia Osmonbekov laid out the story on October 21, drawing on reporting by Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal. Anthropic did not respond to Fortune's request for comment, and a spokesperson for Schmidt declined to comment on the record.
What is reported, and what is estimated
The 1% figure comes from people familiar with the matter, via Bloomberg, and is not confirmed by Anthropic. Those sources said Schmidt's investment was in the tens of millions. The $20 billion figure is contingent on an IPO at $2 trillion. Fortune calculates that valuation would be more than 4,300 times the company's 2021 valuation. An early investor told Fortune's Shawn Tully that shares could trade at $2.4 trillion after listing, which Fortune labels speculative.
How the investment began
Per the Journal, Schmidt's route to the company began with an introduction from Cami Clark, whom he dated for three years starting in 2011 and who later married Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei. Schmidt visited the couple's apartment in 2018, three years before Amodei co-founded Anthropic. In 2021 Schmidt joined the early investors in Anthropic's $124 million Series A, which valued the company at $461 million, according to PitchBook. A funding round on May 28 valued Anthropic at $965 billion.
The financials behind the IPO
Citing Anthropic's S-1 as reviewed by the Journal, Fortune reports first-half 2026 revenue of $16.3 billion, up from $1.1 billion a year earlier, and a first-half loss of $80.7 billion, of which $72 billion came from an accounting charge tied to convertible debt and financing instruments. Compute spending in the first half was $9 billion, up from $2.3 billion and already above the $7.3 billion spent in all of 2025. Anthropic has signed $450 billion in mostly noncancellable cloud deals over the next decade. Risks include a narrow customer base and uncertain access to enough compute.
The bar a $2 trillion valuation sets
Fortune states Anthropic would need annual profits of $59 billion to $79 billion to justify a $2 trillion IPO, which it presents as an estimate. The article says the company may go public as soon as next month.
Source: Fortune. This is an AI Business Watch summary of the original report.