JAKARTA - Anthropic has discussed the possibility of buying robotics company Physical Intelligence. The news was denied by the company's leadership, but the latest report shows that the acquisition talks did take place.
TechCrunch reported Wednesday, July 22, citing The Information, that Anthropic and Physical Intelligence held talks this spring.
The rumor surfaced after technology blogger Robert Scoble posted news of the acquisition at X over the weekend. The details may not be accurate, but talks between the two companies are said to have taken place.
Physical Intelligence has raised more than $1 billion in funding. The company was also reportedly in talks to raise another $1 billion in new funding at a valuation of $11 billion.
His π0.5 model is said to be widely used as a "robot brain" in robotics research.
Physical Intelligence CEO Karol Hausman said the acquisition report was not true through a Slack message to employees. According to The Information, the message was accompanied by a moving image of a character from the Office series shaking his head.
One of the founders of Physical Intelligence, Lachy Groom, did not respond to TechCrunch's request for a response.
For Anthropic, buying a team that already dominates robotics is considered to cut development time for years.
TechCrunch assesses that understanding the physical world may be needed to build more advanced AI systems. This ability cannot be fully obtained from internet text.
Anthropic doesn't have a hardware lab like OpenAI. However, the company has tested Claude's ability to help laypeople program dog robots through Project Fetch.
In the second stage of testing, Anthropic said the newer model was able to complete the task about 20 times faster than the human team with the best help from Claude a year earlier.
OpenAI was the first to return to the field of robotics. The company once developed a robotic hand that was able to solve the Rubik's Cube, but closed its robotics team in 2021.
The team was re-formed in 2024 and built a humanoid robot laboratory in San Francisco. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman then announced the recruitment for OpenAI Robotics at the end of May.
OpenAI's initial focus is on robots for infrastructure work. In the long term, the company wants to bring personal robots to everyone.
OpenAI's position as an investor could become a complication if Physical Intelligence is actually sold.
Physical Intelligence's investor base also overlaps with OpenAI. Khosla Ventures and Thrive Capital have invested in both companies, while Founders Fund is reportedly involved in Physical Intelligence's latest funding round.
It is not known whether OpenAI's investment is accompanied by information rights or first refusal rights on sales to competitors.
The first right of refusal gives investors the opportunity to take a transaction on the same terms before the sale is completed with another party.
If Physical Intelligence is actually sold, OpenAI's status as a shareholder could give it a stronger position than Anthropic. OpenAI also has close ties to Groom and is expanding its footprint in robotics.
Anthropic has made four known acquisitions this year. OpenAI has been more aggressive, buying at least 17 companies since 2023.
Both companies are also reportedly preparing to list on the exchange. Anthropic filed a confidential IPO document on June 1, followed by OpenAI a week later.
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