AI's biggest winners may not be the frontier labs building it

Frontier AI labs like Anthropic and OpenAI face massive losses despite huge revenue, raising doubts about whether they can justify their valuations ahead of potential IPOs. Anthropic lost over $8 billion last year on $4.6 billion revenue and committed $500 billion to infrastructure, while OpenAI projects $280 billion cumulative cash burn through 2030 despite revenue growth. Investors still value Anthropic above $2 trillion. History shows inventors rarely capture most value from breakthroughs; electricity and internet beneficiaries were users like Ford and platforms, not infrastructure builders. AI models are commoditizing, shifting advantage to firms with proprietary data and customer expertise.