Michael Grimes on Tech Markets; A Chart on Megadeals

We’re in a new year, but the major headline in venture capital is the same: It’s all about megadeals for artificial intelligence startups. 

Lightspeed Venture Partners is expected to lead a $2 billion round of funding for Anthropic at a $60 billion valuation, Stephanie confirmed. The new funding, at a higher valuation than we reported four months ago, would give Anthropic more firepower to take on well-heeled OpenAI. Already, Anthropic has been making the aggressive sales pitch that its AI model, Claude, is better for corporate customers who want to build their own custom models. 

The dependence of these deeply technical companies on good old-fashioned sales forces was top of mind as I wrote today about Morgan Stanley’s top tech banker, Michael Grimes, raising $40 million for a new academic center to teach sales tactics to undergraduates. Sales is the kind of career many people fall into by accident, but sales is crucial to startups and bigger firms in meeting revenue targets.