Sequoia Joins GIC and Coatue in Mega Anthropic Round as AI Valuations Surge

The reported US$25 billion raise would value the Claude developer at US$350 billion, highlighting both investor conviction in frontier AI—and rising concerns over market concentration

Venture capital firm Sequoia Capital is set to join GIC and U.S. investor Coatue in a major funding round for Anthropic, according to a report by the FT citing sources familiar with the matter. The round is expected to target up to US$25 billion and could value the artificial intelligence company at around US$350 billion.

The Financial Times reported that GIC and Coatue are each expected to commit about US$1.5 billion to the Claude chatbot maker. If completed, the deal would rank among the largest private funding rounds ever raised by a technology company, underlining the continued flow of capital into a small group of frontier AI developers.

A step-change in scale and valuation

Neither Sequoia, Anthropic, GIC nor Coatue responded to requests for comment, and Reuters said it could not independently verify the Financial Times report. Still, the reported figures point to a sharp escalation in both deal size and valuation compared with Anthropic’s previous raises.

Anthropic last disclosed a US$13 billion Series F round in early September, which valued the company at US$183 billion. A US$350 billion valuation would nearly double that figure in a matter of months, reflecting how quickly investor expectations have reset for companies building large-scale foundation models.

Last year, Anthropic also secured commitments of up to US$15 billion from Microsoft and Nvidia, signalling strong strategic interest from major technology and infrastructure players that stand to benefit from wider AI adoption.

Why investors keep backing frontier AI

The reported round comes as global spending on artificial intelligence continues to rise, driven by rapid enterprise adoption of generative AI tools across software development, customer support, data analysis and creative workflows. For large investors, companies like Anthropic represent rare assets: model builders with the scale, talent, and computing access required to compete at the frontier.

Several factors continue to support investor appetite:

• High barriers to entry, given the cost of training and running large language models
• Strategic demand from cloud providers and chipmakers seeking long-term AI workloads
• Enterprise pull, as large organisations move from experimentation to deployment

These dynamics have concentrated capital around a small number of AI labs, even as thousands of startups build applications on top of their models.

Growing unease beneath the optimism

At the same time, the pace of capital deployment has intensified debate over whether parts of the AI market are overheating. Analysts have warned that soaring valuations, combined with heavy infrastructure spending and uncertain long-term monetisation, could expose investors to downside risk if growth expectations falter.

Concerns have also been raised about market concentration, as only a handful of companies attract the bulk of funding, compute resources, and talent. While this may accelerate technical progress in the near term, it could limit competition and shape the economics of the broader AI ecosystem.

Sequoia’s role adds weight to the deal

Sequoia’s reported participation adds further prominence to the round. Founded in 1972, the California-based firm was an early backer of companies including Google, Apple, Cisco and YouTube. In recent years, Sequoia has increased its exposure to artificial intelligence, viewing the sector as a long-term platform shift rather than a short-term cycle.

For GIC and Coatue, the investment would further expand their exposure to large-scale AI infrastructure and model developers, reinforcing a trend among global asset managers to place sizeable, concentrated bets on a small number of category leaders.

Conclusion

If the reported funding round proceeds as outlined by the Financial Times, it would mark another milestone in the rapid financialisation of artificial intelligence. The scale of the proposed investment highlights both the confidence investors place in frontier model builders like Anthropic and the growing gap between these firms and the rest of the startup ecosystem.

For now, capital continues to chase scale, compute, and technical leadership. Whether valuations at this level prove sustainable will depend on how quickly AI leaders can convert technological dominance into durable, profitable businesses—an open question as the sector enters its next phase of growth.

Quick Takeaways

• Sequoia Capital is set to join GIC and Coatue in a reported funding round for Anthropic that could reach US$25 billion and value the company at about US$350 billion.
• The deal, first reported by the Financial Times, would rank among the largest private funding rounds in the technology sector.
• GIC and Coatue are each expected to commit around US$1.5 billion to the Claude chatbot developer.
• Anthropic has already attracted significant backing from major technology players, including up to US$15 billion in commitments from Microsoft and Nvidia.
• The reported valuation underscores strong investor confidence in frontier AI models, even as concerns grow around market concentration and potential overheating in the AI sector.