Anthropic's founders are seeking voting control through special shares ahead of their upcoming IPO to maintain influence, while pledging to give away 80% of their wealth.
Anthropic is asking its shareholders to approve a structure that would give its seven co-founders a combined 50.1% of the vote on most corporate matters.
# Anthropic's founders seek voting control ahead of IPO | TechCrunch
Source: [https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/25/anthropics-founders-seek-voting-control-ahead-of-ipo/](https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/25/anthropics-founders-seek-voting-control-ahead-of-ipo/)
In Brief
Posted:
8:40 AM PDT · September 25, 2026
**Image Credits:**Samyukta Lakshmi/Bloomberg / Getty ImagesAnthropic’s founders want to stay in charge after the company goes public\. According to The Information, the company is asking shareholders to approve a structure “in the coming days” that would give CEO Dario Amodei and his six co\-founders special shares carrying a combined[50\.1% of the vote](https://www.theinformation.com/articles/anthropic-seeks-palantir-style-voting-control-seven-co-founders-ahead-ipo?utm_source=newsletter.strictlyvc.com&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=svc-beehiiv&_bhlid=0bf009be561f96890c0f78f816f23b357ae403d1&rc=omehqc)on most corporate matters, as long as at least three of them keep a minimum stake\.
This isn’t a new idea; super\-voting shares are how Mark Zuckerberg kept control of Meta, and how Evan Spiegel maintained his hold of Snap\. The list is long\. What’s unusual is the group approach\.
Why do it? The seven co\-founders reportedly own just 2% of the company apiece, Amodei included, and have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth, a commitment the CEO[announced in January](https://darioamodei.com/essay/the-adolescence-of-technology)alongside a warning that AI\-driven wealth concentration could destabilize society\. The new shares carry no extra economic value, but they’d preserve the group’s control once the company starts trading publicly\.
There are twists, too: Anthropic’s Long\-Term Benefit Trust would still choose most of the board; the founders’ board seats would grow from two to three; and employees would get their own stock to break ties on some issues\.
Five\-year\-old Anthropic was valued at $965 billion in May\. The company was recently valued at $1\.5 trillion on the[secondary market](https://www.businessinsider.com/anthropic-1-5-trillion-valuation-on-secondary-markets-2026-8), and its upcoming IPO is expected to reflect that new valuation\.
### Newsletters
Subscribe for the industry’s biggest tech news
## Related
## Latest in AI
Anthropic plans to create a new class of stock with extra voting rights for its co-founders to protect them from shareholder pressure before going public.
Reuters reports that Anthropic's seven cofounders would control 50.1% of key shareholder voting power under its proposed IPO structure, with a separate trust appointing four of seven directors, prompting criticism about transparency and accountability of the mission-driven governance setup.
TechCrunch examines Anthropic's unusually complex corporate governance as it approaches its IPO, detailing how a public benefit company status, a Long-Term Benefit Trust, and founders' special-class stock leave common shareholders with little board-level control.
Before its IPO, Anthropic is designing a structure that allows the founding team to maintain control despite limited shareholding, including super voting rights and non-shareholder director selection.