VCs Break Taboo by Backing Both Anthropic, OpenAI in AI Battle

OpenAI and Anthropic are working to close two of the largest funding rounds in history and increasingly leaning on an overlapping pool of investors to meet their immense capital needs — a practice that was once taboo in startup land.

Sequoia Capital and Altimeter Capital, for example, are both expected to invest in Anthropic’s latest financing, which is set to bring in more than $20 billion. Sequoia first backed OpenAI in 2021, and has invested in several of the company’s rounds since. Altimeter, which has said that OpenAI was its biggest bet ever, is set to invest more than $200 ...