Sequoia Capital is reportedly set to participate in a massive new funding round for Anthropic, the artificial intelligence company behind Claude, a move that is already triggering intense discussion across Silicon Valley. According to the Financial Times, the round is being led by Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC alongside Coatue, with Anthropic seeking to raise $25 billion or more at a staggering $350 billion valuation. If completed, this would more than double Anthropic’s valuation from just four months ago and position it among the most valuable private technology companies in the world.
What makes Sequoia’s involvement particularly notable is its existing exposure to rival AI powerhouses. The firm is already an investor in OpenAI as well as Elon Musk’s xAI, a combination that challenges a long-standing venture capital convention: backing one clear winner in a fiercely competitive, winner-take-most market. By supporting multiple front-runners in foundational AI, Sequoia appears to be signaling a strategic shift toward hedging across the category rather than committing exclusively to a single platform.
The timing of the reported investment adds further complexity. During testimony last year connected to Elon Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI, CEO Sam Altman addressed how competitive risks are managed at the investor level, stating that investors with ongoing access to OpenAI’s confidential information would lose that access “if they made non-passive investments in OpenAI’s competitors,” calling it “industry standard” protection. Against that backdrop, Sequoia’s reported participation in Anthropic’s round is being closely scrutinized for what it may imply about information barriers, governance structures, and evolving norms in AI investing.
Sequoia’s relationships with both Altman and Musk are deep and longstanding. The firm backed Altman’s first startup, Loopt, and has been a major supporter of Musk’s ventures over the years, including SpaceX, Neuralink, and X. This history makes the Anthropic move less surprising on a relational level, but more striking in terms of policy consistency.
The decision also contrasts with Sequoia’s earlier, more conservative stance on competitive overlap. In 2020, the firm reportedly walked away from Finix due to concerns about competing with another portfolio company, Stripe. Now, as Anthropic is said to be preparing for a potential IPO as early as this year, Sequoia’s apparent willingness to hold stakes across competing AI leaders is emerging as one of the most closely watched shifts in the global AI investment landscape.
