Anthropic said this week it is creating the Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, a new entity that will hold 5% of the company's shares, according to Anthropic's own announcement, confirmed by TechCrunch. The move still needs shareholder approval.

Under the structure Anthropic described, the fund can keep growing over time: its board can add another 2 percentage points in shares for every 50% increase in the company's valuation above a set baseline, according to both sources.

Why a separate fund

According to Anthropic, much of the work tied to its mission already happens inside the company itself — AI safety and interpretability research, applied biomedical research, and discounts on Claude for nonprofits and scientific institutions. The company says these activities carry both public-benefit and for-profit value, which is why they stay inside Anthropic rather than moving to the fund.

The fund, Anthropic says, is meant for what doesn't fit that model: large donations to traditional nonprofits or direct distributions to specific populations. One example the company cited is the labor-market impact of AI — Anthropic had already committed $200 million to studying the issue, a figure TechCrunch also confirms, though the company says bolder approaches may be needed as the technology advances.

The company notes that it is common practice for tech companies to offer escalating compensation awards to executives as a company's valuation rises. According to Anthropic, it chose to direct that slice of equity to the public benefit instead of following that path.

Earlier commitments from founders and employees

According to Anthropic, the new fund builds on commitments that already existed inside the company: its co-founders pledged to donate 80% of their equity holdings when Anthropic was founded, and the company runs an equity donation match program for employees, in which about half of staff currently take part, according to Anthropic. Combined with the new fund, Anthropic says roughly 20% of its shares are now dedicated to the public good, on top of whatever additional percentage the valuation milestones add.

A structure built for flexibility

Anthropic structured the fund as a wholly-owned LLC rather than a 501(c)(3) or similar nonprofit format, to allow it to move between different kinds of giving, according to the announcement. The company says none of the fund's Anthropic equity will be used for lobbying or political giving, in the US or abroad.

The announcement lands as public trust in the AI industry keeps eroding, according to TechCrunch, which quotes Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei describing the situation, in his words, as "fundamentally a crisis of trust." TechCrunch frames the fund as part of Anthropic's response to that broader scrutiny, a point the company's own announcement does not address directly.

Anthropic says it will share more about the fund's governance, including the valuation milestones that could add to its stake, in the coming months, and will also publish a report on its progress against its stated mission.

In practice

  • What it is: a separate entity called the Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, structured as a wholly-owned LLC, according to the company.
  • How much it gets: 5% of Anthropic's shares, pending shareholder approval, with the possibility of another 2 percentage points for every 50% rise in the company's valuation, according to Anthropic and TechCrunch.
  • What it's for: donations to traditional nonprofits or direct distributions to specific populations, according to the company — one cited focus is AI's impact on the labor market, the subject of $200 million in research Anthropic had already pledged.
  • Who's affected: nonprofits, scientific institutions and workers potentially affected by AI-driven labor-market shifts, the groups the company names as its stated focus areas.
  • What's still missing: Anthropic says it will detail the fund's governance and valuation milestones in the coming months, along with a separate report on its progress against its public-benefit mission.