IF There has been a common narrative around artificial intelligence this year, it is that advances in the technology are shaking up the vast—and hitherto cosy—world of software. In order to keep this blitzkrieg going, the labs at the forefront of AI need to raise enormous amounts of money. That has set the stage for three colossal initial public offerings (IPOs) in a single year: those of OpenAI, led by Sam Altman, Anthropic, under Dario Amodei, and SpaceX, run by Elon Musk, which has merged with xAI, his model-maker. Adding to the frisson, the trio hate each other.
All three are aiming for the stratosphere. OpenAI, which was recently valued at $840bn, is said to be looking for a price tag of $1trn, or 40 times its current annualised revenue. Anthropic, last valued at $380bn, a multiple of around 20 times its annualised sales, will probably be priced at upwards of $500bn. Most ambitious of all is SpaceX, which was valued at $1.25trn when it merged with xAI and is reportedly seeking to list at $1.5trn. That would put it squarely among the world’s ten most-valuable listed firms—and could even make Mr Musk history’s first trillionaire.