Anthropic to put 5% of its shares into a new 'Public Benefit Fund'

Artificial intelligence company Anthropic says it will commit 5% of its shares to a new entity called the Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, subject to approval by its stockholders.

In a statement published on Sunday (US time), the maker of the Claude AI models said its board could add a further 2% of the company’s shares “for every 50% increase in the company’s value above a set baseline”. It did not say what the baseline is and said it would publish details of the valuation milestones, and of the fund’s structure and governance, “in the coming months”.

The fund will be a wholly owned limited liability company rather than a charity, which Anthropic said would allow it to switch between “different forms of giving”. The company said possible uses included “large donations to traditional nonprofits or direct distributions to specific populations”, and cited the effect of AI on jobs as one example. Anthropic said it had already committed $US200 million to studying that issue.

“None of the Anthropic equity held by the LLC will be used for lobbying or political giving, in the US or abroad,” the statement said.

Anthropic, which is registered as a public benefit corporation, said its co-founders had pledged to donate 80% of their shares and that about half of its employees take part in an equity donation programme that the company matches. Combined with the new fund, it said, roughly 20% of its shares would be “dedicated to the public good”.

TechCrunch reported that Anthropic did not say who would decide which projects the fund supports.