The AI funding boom is entering a new phase. The biggest names are no longer just raising huge private rounds. They are starting to look increasingly like public-market stories, with IPO expectations, billion-dollar funding rounds and infrastructure companies preparing to follow them.
The headline this week is Anthropic. Six of its investors reportedly expect the company to go public in October at a valuation of $2 trillion or more.
That number has not been set by Anthropic itself. But even as an investor expectation, it shows just how far private AI valuations have moved.
Anthropic was reportedly valued at $965 billion in May. Its backers now expect annualized revenue to reach $100 billion to $120 billion by the end of 2026, compared with around $47 billion in May.
If an IPO actually happens at $2 trillion, it would be bigger than SpaceX’s June listing valuation of $1.77 trillion.
But the bigger story is not just Anthropic.
The AI market is building an entire ecosystem around these valuations
The money is spreading from model companies into databases, coding tools, power storage, data centers, cybersecurity and other businesses that support the AI buildout.
That makes this week’s funding activity particularly interesting.
Anthropic is setting the tone
The reported $2 trillion valuation expectation comes from investors, not the company.
That distinction matters.
Anthropic’s CFO Krishna Rao has reportedly started early discussions with investors, but valuation has not been discussed and senior executives have not established an internal target.
There are also real challenges ahead.
- Chinese AI models are putting pressure on pricing.
- Regulation remains a major uncertainty.
- Anthropic has an ongoing dispute with the US government.
- Its flagship model reportedly costs significantly more to operate than OpenAI’s.
At the same time, there are signs of strong commercial demand.
According to Ramp’s August AI Index, 43.5% of US businesses in its corporate-spend dataset paid for Anthropic subscriptions or tokens in July. That was up 1.1 percentage points from June and 2.9 points ahead of OpenAI.
That does not mean Anthropic has captured the entire enterprise AI market. Ramp’s data covers a specific group of businesses using its payment products.
But it does show why investors are willing to attach enormous numbers to the company.
Databricks just made another huge private-market statement
While Anthropic’s potential IPO is grabbing attention, Databricks quietly delivered another signal about where late-stage private valuations are heading.
The company raised $5 billion at a $190 billion valuation.
What makes the deal remarkable is how quickly the valuation moved.
Databricks raised another $5 billion just six months earlier at a $134 billion valuation.
It has now raised $10 billion across two rounds in six months.
The company says it has crossed a $7 billion revenue run rate, with second-quarter growth above 80% year over year.
Its Lakehouse warehousing business has passed $1.5 billion in annualized revenue, while Lakebase, its database for AI agents, has passed $100 million.
There is also an interesting demand signal behind the round.
Databricks reportedly initially planned to raise just $1 billion. Investors wanted to put in much more, with reports suggesting demand reached as high as $15 billion.
That is what happens when investors believe a company is positioned at the center of a major technology cycle.
The infrastructure behind AI is becoming an investment story of its own
The next piece of the puzzle is data centers.
Vantage Data Centers is reportedly considering a sale or IPO at a valuation of around $100 billion, potentially raising about $10 billion if it lists.
The discussions are still preliminary. No formal process has begun.
But Vantage is not alone.
CyrusOne and DayOne are also reportedly planning listings.
This matters because the AI boom requires much more than models.
It needs:
- Data centers
- Power
- Cooling
- Networking
- Chips
- Storage
- Databases
- Cybersecurity
- Software for AI agents
The companies providing that infrastructure are increasingly attracting capital at valuations that would have looked extraordinary only a few years ago.
And they are beginning to approach the public markets alongside the AI model companies themselves.
The funding boom is getting more concentrated
PitchBook’s latest data puts AI startup funding in the first half of 2026 at more than $407 billion.
That is already well above the $264 billion raised across all of 2025.
But the most striking part is where the money went.
OpenAI and Anthropic accounted for about $217 billion, more than half of the total, across three rounds.
At the same time, the number of AI deals is moving in the opposite direction.
There were roughly 3,500 AI deals in the first half of 2026, compared with 8,290 across all of last year.
That suggests investors are not simply throwing money across the entire AI startup universe.
They are becoming more selective.
The largest companies are attracting enormous amounts of capital, while the number of deals is shrinking.
The next layer of AI companies is still attracting serious money
The funding activity below the mega-cap names tells a different but equally interesting story.
Lovable raised $400 million at a reported $13.3 billion valuation.
The Stockholm-based company had raised $330 million at a $6.6 billion valuation only eight months earlier.
Cognition AI, the company behind Devin, is reportedly discussing a new round at a valuation of $40 billion or more, although the deal has not been confirmed.
Legora, a legal AI company, is reportedly discussing a financing at more than $10 billion, after extending its Series D at $5.6 billion in April.
CodeRabbit raised $143 million at a reported $1.5 billion valuation.
Corma, founded by former DeepMind researchers and Unit 8200 veterans, raised a $60 million seed round.
That last deal stands out.
A $60 million seed round is unusual even in today’s AI market. It also shows that investors are willing to fund companies operating deeper inside the AI stack, rather than only backing the largest model providers.
Defense is becoming another major AI funding theme
Two counter-drone companies raised a combined $550 million within 48 hours.
Cambridge Aerospace raised $300 million at a reported $3.4 billion valuation.
Neros Technologies raised $250 million at a reported $2.5 billion valuation.
Neros’ round was co-led by Sequoia Capital and the American Strategic Technology Fund.
The important point is not simply the size of the rounds.
It is the growing overlap between AI, autonomy, defense and government-linked capital.
AI is increasingly being funded not only as a software opportunity, but also as part of a broader technology and national-security strategy.
Power may become the next bottleneck
One of the quieter deals this week may say a lot about where the AI infrastructure story is going.
Form Energy raised $750 million to expand production of its long-duration iron-air batteries.
The company says its commercial backlog has grown roughly fourfold this year to about 80 gigawatt-hours, driven partly by demand from data centers.
That creates an interesting connection.
The same AI buildout driving demand for data centers is also creating demand for the power infrastructure needed to keep those facilities running.
If AI computing capacity continues to expand, electricity becomes just as important to the story as chips and servers.
The public markets are getting closer
There is another trend worth watching.
Private-market investors are increasingly being joined by crossover funds, which invest in both private and public companies.
T. Rowe Price, Coatue and Fidelity are examples of firms that can take positions in late-stage private companies and potentially continue holding them after an IPO.
Their involvement does not guarantee a listing.
But it does show how closely private and public markets are becoming connected.
That connection matters because the next wave of IPOs could give public-market investors access to companies that have spent years building value privately.
SpaceX has already made that transition.
Anthropic could potentially be next.
Databricks has not announced IPO plans, but its latest $190 billion valuation puts it firmly in the conversation.
The bigger question is what happens after the headlines
A $2 trillion Anthropic IPO would be a major market event.
But the more important question may be whether these valuations can hold once investors have to price these companies every day in the public market.
Private markets can support very large valuations when capital is abundant and investors compete for limited shares.
Public markets are different.
Companies have to disclose more. Investors can sell. Earnings expectations become more visible. Valuations are constantly tested.
That does not mean today’s private valuations are wrong.
It means the public market will eventually provide a much tougher test.
And that test is getting closer.
What we’re watching
Anthropic’s IPO plans
The company itself has not set a valuation target, but investor expectations of a $2 trillion listing show the scale of the opportunity being priced in.
Databricks’ next move
A $190 billion private valuation and $7 billion revenue run rate put the company among the most important late-stage AI businesses to watch.
Data-center IPOs
Vantage, CyrusOne and DayOne could give public investors another way to participate in the AI infrastructure boom.
Crossover fund activity
Large public-market managers are increasingly participating in private rounds. Their activity could offer clues about how institutional investors are positioning for the next IPO cycle.
The funding gap
AI capital is becoming more concentrated in a handful of companies. The key question is whether that concentration continues or whether capital starts moving toward the next layer of startups.
The takeaway
The AI funding story is no longer just about who is building the best model.
It is becoming a much bigger market story.
Models need data. Data needs infrastructure. Infrastructure needs power. And all of it needs capital.
That is why Anthropic’s potential $2 trillion IPO, Databricks’ $190 billion valuation and the growing pipeline of data-center listings should not be viewed as isolated events.
They are pieces of the same much larger investment cycle.
The next stage will be watching which of these private-market valuations can survive the transition into public markets.
The valuations, funding rounds and potential IPO plans discussed above are based on reported information and may change. Private-company financials can be unaudited and secondary-market pricing may not represent fair or executable value. This article is for informational purposes only and is not investment advice.