Anthropic prepares supervoting power for founders ahead of IPO: Report

Anthropic has been preparing to give CEO Dario Amodei and ​other co-founders a class of stock with extra voting power ‌to help insulate them from external shareholder pressure, ​the Information reported on Tuesday, citing ⁠two people familiar with the matter.

The company is also planning to maintain its existing body of non-shareholder trustees with a ‌special class of stock to elect a majority of members to the company’s board ‌of directors, according to the report.

The specifics of ‌the ⁠voting arrangements could not be learned, and the ⁠plans could still change, the report said.

Anthropic did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Such a move would mark ​the first time ‌Anthropic’s leaders would have extra voting power. The Claude maker’s co-founders hold relatively small ownership in the company, compared to founders of other tech firms.

Amodei himself ‌owns only about 2% of the company, ​the Information said, citing a person close to Anthropic.

But dual-class structures aimed at giving ⁠supervoting power to leaders are common among founder-led companies, and is designed to give founders greater control and insulate ‌them from short-term shareholder pressure.

SpaceX’s dual-class structure, for instance, gives founder and CEO Elon Musk significant voting power. At Meta, CEO Mark Zuckerberg holds about 60% voting control by way of his ownership of super-voting shares.

The reported move at Anthropic comes as ‌the company prepares for a potential initial public offering later this ​year, which is expected to be one of the biggest market debuts in history.

Anthropic ⁠is structured as a public benefit corporation, which is legally ⁠required to balance commercial success with social and public benefit. The company also has a ‌Long-Term Benefit Trust, an independent oversight body that exists to make sure the startup delivers on its ​public benefit mission.