Anthropic Founders to Control 50.1% of Voting Power Through New Founder LLC Ahead of Nasdaq IPO

Anthropic's seven co-founders will hold 50.1% of voting power in the AI company through a newly created entity, Founder LLC, according to its IPO prospectus filed Monday. The structure lets the founders "determine the outcome of matters submitted to a vote of stockholders" for the foreseeable future, limiting institutional and retail investor influence. Anthropic plans to list on Nasdaq under the ticker "ANT." The arrangement combines with a 2023-established Long-Term Benefit Trust, which elects and removes a majority of board members via a special Class T common stock carrying no other voting rights. Trustees include former Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke. Nasdaq rules will classify Anthropic as a "controlled company." Anthropic, registered as a Delaware public benefit corporation, said the governance structure is "novel" with "no direct precedent" among public companies, and warned it could make board or management changes harder and deter unsolicited takeover bids. SpaceX, which listed in June, is similarly classified as controlled due to CEO Elon Musk's majority voting power.