US AI behemoth, Anthropic, is offering its UK employees staggering salaries as it seeks to establish a strong presence in the country.
The firm, which only commenced operations in the UK at the beginning of 2023, expanded its workforce from six to 43 in 2024, causing staff costs to skyrocket from £3.6m to £24m, as reported by City AM.
This increase implies that, if distributed evenly, Anthropic’s salary expenditure would be sufficient to pay each UK employee nearly £560,000 annually.
Recently filed accounts with Companies House reveal that the UK branch’s turnover leapt from £5m to £29.5m and its pre-tax profit soared from £500,919 to £2.6m.
Anthropic was established in 2021 by CEO Dario Amodei, Daniela Amodei, Jared Kaplan, Jack Clark and Ben Mann in San Francisco.
The company has developed a suite of large language models named Claude and was valued at over $183bn last month.
In September 2023, Anthropic received a $4bn investment from Amazon, followed by a £2bn investment from Google the subsequent month.
Anthropic poaches British AI firm’s leadership
In August, City AM reported that Anthropic had recruited the three co-founders of London-based AI startup HumanLoop, along with the majority of its engineering and research personnel.
The new hires included Chief Executive Raza Habib, Chief Technology Officer Peter Hayes and Chief Product Officer Jordan Burgess, all of whom founded HumanLoop in 2020 as a spinout from University College London.
HumanLoop, a company that developed a platform for businesses to test, integrate and compare large language models (LLMs) into their operations, has received support from Y Combinator, Index Ventures and AlbionVC. The platform was designed with a focus on aiding developers in deploying AI tools safely and efficiently.
The firm’s clientele included financial services companies, healthcare providers and technology firms.
Anthropic, while confirming it did not acquire the company or its intellectual property, stated that the team’s expertise would be “invaluable” in advancing AI safety and tooling.
Earlier this year, Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei cautioned that AI could potentially wipe out up to 50 per cent of all entry-level white-collar jobs within the next five years. He highlighted the UK market as being particularly susceptible to disruption.
During his firm’s first developer conference, Amodei noted that the widespread adoption of AI, particularly advanced language models like Claude-Anthropic’s flagship product, is progressing faster than most people anticipate.
OpenAI UK rakes in millions
In July, City AM reported that OpenAI had generated millions of pounds since the launch of its artificial intelligence (AI) service ChatGPT in the UK.
The UK branch of the American tech behemoth concluded last year with current assets totalling £56.2m. This included £42.4m in the bank and an additional £13.7m owed by debtors, according to accounts filed with Companies House.
The business’s current assets of £1.1m at the end of the 15 months to 31 December, 2023, comprised £198,915 in the bank and £973,990 owed by debtors.
OpenAI’s non-current assets also increased from £178,823 to £964,495, but its current liabilities also soared from £476,555 to £42.2m.
Of the £42.2m it owes, £39.8m is inter-company debt which is not anticipated to be repaid to its US parent.
By the end of 2024, the company’s shareholders’ funds had risen from £875,173 to £6.2m while it posted a profit of £4.1m for the year, a significant improvement from a loss of £1.2m.
According to the results, OpenAI’s workforce grew from 19 to 55. It’s believed that the business now employs approximately 100 people in the UK.
OpenAI UK Limited was established in September 2022 when ChatGPT was launched.
