Menlo Ventures And Anthropic Open $100M Fund

Another day and another AI fund debuts.

Menlo Ventures announced the launch of its $100 million AI fund — named the Anthology Fund — in partnership with generative AI startup and OpenAI competitor, Anthropic.

The new fund will look to back founders building AI-first applications and infrastructure solutions that leverage Anthropic’s technology and AI models.

Investments will concentrate on — but won’t be limited to — five areas of AI: infrastructure, frontier/novel application, consumer experiences, trust and safety and solutions that maximize societal benefits. The fund will invest from seed to expansion stages, with investments starting at $100,000.

“From our earliest meetings with Anthropic when we first invested in early 2023, we were impressed by their team’s caliber and commitment to world-changing, safe AI innovation,” wrote Menlo’s Matt Murphy and Tim Tully in a blog.

“With the Anthology Fund, we’ve teamed up to further our commitment to the most imaginative AI pioneers,” they continued.

Menlo took part in Anthropic’s Series C in 2023 and earlier this year led a $750 million round in Anthropic.

Another AI fund

While Anthropic will not take a stake in the companies the fund invests in, an AI or big tech company helping to create an AI-specific fund has become the norm.

The OpenAI Startup Fund was launched in 2022, investing $175 million raised from OpenAI partners. OpenAI itself is not an investor.

Last year, Salesforce Ventures 1 — Salesforce’s venture arm — announced a Generative AI Fund to $500 million. The firm is an investor in Anthropic.

In May, Databricks announced a new Databricks AI Fund as part of Databricks Ventures.