Anthropic’s latest feud with the Trump admin may actually help it, sales data suggests

Anthropic, a leading AI lab, recently surpassed OpenAI in market share for business spending and achieved its first-ever profitable quarter, prompting a confidential IPO filing. This growth occurred despite ongoing tensions with the Trump administration over the use of its advanced AI models. Remarkably, sales data suggests that past government scrutiny has inadvertently boosted Anthropic's business adoption.

The latest development saw the Trump administration ban Anthropic's state-of-the-art models, Mythos 5 and Fable 5, citing an obscure export control directive. This action forced Anthropic to withdraw these powerful models from the market. Previously, the company had been declared a supply-chain risk for refusing government requests for mass surveillance and autonomous weapons applications.

Ironically, this government intervention appears to validate the perceived power of Anthropic's models, potentially enhancing its reputation. According to Ramp's lead economist, Ara Kharazian, the "aura" of having models deemed "too dangerous to use" could further drive business adoption.

While the financial impact of pulling Mythos and Fable 5 is not fully clear, Ramp's data, covering over 70,000 businesses, indicates robust and growing usage of Anthropic's existing Opus models. Anthropic's share of AI subscriptions among businesses rose to 41% in May, surpassing OpenAI's 39.5%. The company's Claude Code also maintains a strong reputation as a powerful AI coding tool, contributing to its increasing enterprise adoption.