On Sunday, October 18, the AI company Anthropic announced its plan to allocate 5% of the company’s shares to the newly established “Anthropic Public Benefit Fund.” The company further stated that for each future valuation surpassing the set benchmark by 50%, the board could decide to allocate an additional 2% of shares to enhance the flexibility and scale of its efforts in advancing public interests. This move drew attention from Elon Musk, who suggested “giving shares directly to the public.”
Currently, the initial allocation of the 5% shares requires shareholder approval. Anthropic indicated that the fund would be set up as a wholly-owned limited liability company (LLC) by the company, rather than as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization or other forms to maintain flexibility among different donation methods.
According to a blog post by Anthropic, most of the work towards achieving its mission is carried out internally within the company, including research on AI safety and explainability, applications in biomedical research, and providing discounts on the use of Claude AI to non-profit organizations and research institutions.
The company emphasized that these activities have both charitable and commercial value, hence executed directly within the company. Anthropic also stated that within the fund structure, the higher the company’s valuation, the higher the proportion of shares allocated to the public interest; these shares would be directed towards public interests rather than used for executive compensation increases.
Additionally, Anthropic’s co-founders had pledged to donate 80% of their shareholdings at the company’s inception. The company also implemented an employee stock donation matching program, with approximately half of the staff participating. Combined with the recently announced public benefit fund, about 20% of shares will be specifically utilized for public interests, with the potential for this percentage to increase upon the company achieving certain valuation milestones.
On October 18, Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, and head of AI company xAI, took to the social media platform X to suggest that Anthropic directly give shares to the public, adding, “This is what I will do.”
Furthermore, Anthropic mentioned that adopting a public benefit fund would enhance flexibility and scale, potentially used for making substantial donations to traditional non-profit organizations, providing direct resources to specific groups, and addressing the impact of AI on the labor market.
While the company had previously committed $200 million to research and address this issue, Anthropic believed that the rapid pace of AI development necessitated bolder actions to handle the labor market’s disruptions.
During the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank annual meeting in Bangkok, Thailand, last week, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva stated that approximately 40% of jobs globally would be affected by AI, with some jobs potentially being enhanced, downgraded, or disappearing. This percentage is even higher, reaching 60%, in advanced economies and around 23% in low-income countries.
Anthropic stressed that any Anthropic shareholdings held by the fund would not be used for lobbying or political contributions in the United States or other countries.
The company mentioned that in the coming months, they would further elaborate on the governance structure of the fund, its operations, and the potential expansion of its shareholding valuation threshold. They also plan to release a public impact report detailing progress towards fulfilling their mission.