Anthropic Walks Away from $6bn Decart Acquisition
Anthropic has ended its deal to acquire Decart AI, valued at $6 billion, according to Bloomberg. The news comes after due diligence revealed differing priorities between the companies.
While Decart is known for its world models—training AI on vast datasets to understand physical objects—Anthropic sought chip efficiency, aiming to optimize its existing compute power rather than enter a new product category.
The initial talks, reported in August, sparked curiosity due to the substantial valuation. The deal’s rationale focused on making chips work harder during both training and inference, potentially reducing customer service costs for Anthropic. However, this strategy aligns with their goal of maximizing performance from existing infrastructure, which might have conflicted with shareholder expectations ahead of their anticipated IPO.
Decart raised $300 million in May 2026, valuing the company at nearly $4 billion. A $6 billion acquisition would have represented a significant premium, raising questions about the financial rationale for such a move just weeks before the planned listing.
Founded in 2023 by Dean, Orian Leitersdorf, and Moshe Shalev, Decart operates two distinct businesses: chip efficiency solutions and world models. The latter includes applications like virtual try-on technology for e-commerce platforms, with eBay as both an investor and customer.