Anthropic Confidentially Files for IPO as It Prepares to Enter Public Markets

Anthropic confidentially filed for an IPO on Monday, making it the third company to install investor-overriding mission guardians in a for-profit structure. Fortune reported that only three companies have ever adopted such arrangements, and two of them have already encountered significant problems.

Candidate Idan Reiter, examines these structures as Anthropic enters public markets and OpenAI faces ongoing scrutiny. The paper analyzes how mission guardians can harm investors and undermine the goals they were created to protect. Unilever acquired Ben & Jerry’s in 2000 and agreed to install self-perpetuating independent directors who could override Unilever to protect the brand’s social mission.

In 2021, the independent board announced it would not renew the license of Ben & Jerry’s Israeli licensee over Unilever’s objections. Unilever overrode the independent directors in 2022 and gave the Israeli licensee rights to sell Ben & Jerry’s in Israel and its controlled territories in perpetuity.

Unilever then spun off its ice cream businesses, fired the Ben & Jerry’s CEO after informing the Independent Board, and Jerry Greenfield quit during the public dispute.

Unilever’s market cap dropped by $20 to $26 billion in the months following the July 2021 boycotts. The stock fell 8% in the first week and was down more than a fifth over the following six months. Seven states—Florida, Texas, New York, New Jersey, Arizona, and Illinois—divested pension fund holdings in Unilever totaling almost $1 billion.

Jesse Fried said the Ben & Jerry’s arrangement was “an ill-considered arrangement” that he assumed no one would ever replicate. ” Before its 2025 restructuring, OpenAI had nonprofit directors controlling a for-profit subsidiary. The board fired Sam Altman in November 2023, reportedly in part over safety concerns, which led to nearly all of OpenAI’s 770 employees threatening to leave for Microsoft.

The board reversed course and reinstated Altman, after which safety-focused board members were pushed out and prominent safety researchers departed to start competing ventures. ” OpenAI completed its conversion to a public benefit corporation in October 2025, with the nonprofit, now called the OpenAI Foundation, retaining the power to appoint every director on the board.

The OpenAI Foundation’s Safety and Security Committee holds veto rights over safety-related decisions.

The current OpenAI board was selected by Sam Altman himself, and nearly every OpenAI Foundation director also sits on the board. OpenAI removed the word “safely” from its mission statement during the 2025 restructuring. ” He noted that the Foundation is still mandated by state attorneys general to focus on safety and security and retains veto rights on those issues.

Anthropic pairs a controlling Long-Term Benefit Trust with a public benefit corporation. A supermajority of Anthropic’s investors can terminate the Long-Term Benefit Trust and remove the directors it appointed. The Trust can only nominate a majority of Anthropic’s board, not the entire board, and certain decisions require a supermajority at the board level.

Ilya Sutskever and Mira Murati left OpenAI to found their own companies, and neither adopted a guardian structure. Fortune first convened its Brainstorm Tech event in 2001.