Anthropic’s Plan to Win the AI Race
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Anthropic is one of the world’s leading AI model providers, especially in areas like coding. But its AI assistant, Claude, is nowhere near as popular as OpenAI’s ChatGPT. According to chief product officer Mike Krieger, Anthropic doesn’t plan to win the AI race by building a mainstream AI assistant.

## Not Focused on Mass-Market Consumer Adoption

“I hope Claude reaches as many people as possible,” Krieger told me onstage at the HumanX AI conference earlier this week. “But I think, [for] our ambitions, the critical path isn’t through mass-market consumer adoption right now.”

Instead, Krieger says Anthropic is focused on two things: building the best models; and what he calls “vertical experiences that unlock agents.” The first of these is Claude Code, Anthropic’s AI coding tool that Krieger says amassed 100,000 users within its first week of availability. He says there are more of these so-called agents for specific use cases coming this year and that Anthropic is working on “smaller, cheaper models” for developers.

## The Future of Human-AI Interaction

Krieger made his name as the cofounder of Instagram and then the news aggregation app Artifact before joining Anthropic nearly a year ago. “One of the reasons I joined Anthropic is that I think we have a unique role that we can play in shaping what the future of human-AI interaction looks like,” he says. “I think we have a differentiated take on that. How can we empower rather than just be a pure replacement for people? How do we make people aware of both the potentials and the limitations of AI?”

## A Unique Approach to AI Models

Given its history, Anthropic is considered to be one of the more cautious labs. But now it seems set on making its models less sanitized. The company’s latest release, Sonnet 3.7, will refuse to answer a prompt 45 percent less often than before, according to Krieger. “There are going to be some models that are going to be super YOLO and then other models that may be even more cautious. I’ll be really happy if people feel like our models are striking that balance.”

## An Exclusive Interview with Mike Krieger

I had the opportunity to chat with Mike Krieger at the HumanX AI conference, and we covered a lot of ground during our conversation. Here are some of the highlights from our interview:

Is Anthropic an Enterprise Company or a Consumer Company?

“We want to help people get work done – whether it’s coding, whether it’s knowledge work, etc. The parts we’re less focused on are what I would think of as more the entertainment, consumer use case.”

The Path Forward for Anthropic

“One is to continue to build and train the best models in the world. We have a fantastic research team. We’ll continue to invest in that and build on the things that we’re already good at and make those available via an API.”

“The other one is building vertical experiences that unlock agents. The way I think about it is AI doing more than just single-turn work for you, either for your personal life or in the workplace. Claude Code is our first take on a vertical agent with coding, and we’ll do others that play to our model’s advantages and help solve problems for people, including data integration.”

Competing with API Customers

“I think this is a really delicate question for all of the labs and one that I’m trying to approach really thoughtfully. For example, I called Cursor’s CEO and basically all of our leading coding customers to give them a heads-up that we’re launching Claude Code because I see it as complementary. We’re hearing from people using both.”

## Conclusion

Anthropic is taking a unique approach to AI models, focusing on building the best models and creating vertical experiences that unlock agents. With its latest release, Sonnet 3.7, and its AI coding tool, Claude Code, Anthropic is poised to make a significant impact in the AI industry. As Mike Krieger says, “I think we have a differentiated take on that. How can we empower rather than just be a pure replacement for people? How do we make people aware of both the potentials and the limitations of AI?”

What do you think about Anthropic’s approach to AI models? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

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