W.039Thinking Machines is near a $5B round at $40B before the money. That is up to 450 times the run rate a source gave in September
Thinking Machines Lab, Mira Murati’s AI lab, is set to close a $5B round led by Accel at a $40B pre-money valuation, Business Insider reported late on November 5, US time, about $45B after the money by our arithmetic. That is below the $50B it discussed a year ago and 3.75 times its $12B seed valuation of July 2025. In September a person familiar with its finances put its annual revenue run rate at over $100M; Anthropic’s IPO talk is about 18 times its run rate.
The round
The terms match what was reported in September. Business Insider reported that Thinking Machines is set to close a $5B round as soon as this week, led by Accel, at a $40B pre-money valuation, citing people familiar with it. Accel did not respond and a company representative declined to comment, according to the report. Adding the new money gives about $45B post-money; the new investors would own about 11% of the company. In September, The Information reported talks for $5B to $6B at a valuation of at least $40B before the investment, with Nvidia in talks to supply about $2.5B of it. Business Insider’s report does not mention Nvidia, and its participation has not been confirmed.
It is lower than the lab once aimed for. Thinking Machines raised a $2B seed round led by Andreessen Horowitz in July 2025 at a $12B valuation, before it had released a product. In November 2025 Bloomberg reported early talks at about $50B; Business Insider says those talks were abandoned. The new pre-money valuation is 20% below that figure and 3.33 times the seed valuation. If the round closes, the lab will have raised about $7B in announced and reported equity, not counting Nvidia’s undisclosed strategic investment in March.
From $12B at seed to about $45B, after $50B talks fell away
Thinking Machines Lab valuation, $ billions: the July 2025 seed (post-money, closed), November 2025 talks (about $50B, abandoned), September 2026 talks (at least $40B pre-money), and the round Business Insider reports as nearing close, shaded to $40B pre-money and outlined to about $45B with the $5B added (our arithmetic). Grey rows are talks.
What the lab sells
Revenue figures are thin and unaudited. In September, TechCrunch reported an annual revenue run rate of over $100M, citing a source with knowledge of the company’s financials, and The Information reported annualized revenue of at least a few hundred million dollars. Neither figure comes from the company. At $100M the new valuation is 400× the run rate before the money and 450× after it; because the run rate is “over” $100M, those are upper bounds. A run rate of $300M would bring the post-money multiple to 150×. Anthropic’s IPO valuation talk is about 18 times its third-quarter revenue annualized, as W.034 set out.
Its product is Tinker, a service for fine-tuning models, and its own open-weight models. On Thursday, November 5, it released Inkling 2 Small, with 594B parameters (17B active per token, per Dataconomy), priced at $0.30 per million input tokens and $1.00 per million output tokens, according to Artificial Analysis; the company plans to release the weights once external safety testing is complete. For compute, it signed a multiyear deal in March for at least 1 GW of Nvidia Vera Rubin systems from early 2027, with an undisclosed Nvidia investment. Business Insider says about a third of its founding team has left, including Barret Zoph, Luke Metz and Andrew Tulloch, partly drawn by large pay packages from rivals such as Meta and OpenAI.
On a run rate of $100M, the valuation is up to 450 times sales
Valuation divided by annual revenue run rate. Thinking Machines: $40B pre-money (shaded) and about $45B post-money (outlined) divided by $100M, the floor of the “over $100M” a source gave TechCrunch in September, so both are upper bounds. Anthropic: $1.2–1.3T of IPO valuation talk divided by its third-quarter revenue times four, from W.034.
Nvidia’s reported lab stakes
Nvidia investments in AI labs as reported, $ billions: OpenAI ($30B in the $122B round that closed in March, per Bloomberg); Anthropic (up to $10B, committed November 2025); Thinking Machines (about $2.5B, in talks per The Information in September, outlined because it is unconfirmed); xAI (up to $2B of equity in a planned $20B round, per Bloomberg). Earlier Nvidia stakes, including in Thinking Machines’ seed and in Mistral, are undisclosed and not drawn.
What this changes on 06.ai
- Labs funding pack: a $5B round at $40B pre-money, Accel-led, nearing close (reported, not announced). Worth adding once the company confirms; the Nvidia portion is still only reported as talks.
- Labs funding pack: below the frontier labs, valuations set in 2025 talks are being revised down: Thinking Machines’ pre-money is 20% below the $50B it discussed a year ago.
Sources and method
| Item | Figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Round | Set to close a $5B round as soon as this week, led by Accel, at a $40B pre-money valuation; earlier valued at more than $10B after a $2B seed; talks at $50B abandoned; about a third of the founding team has left; a new release on Thursday | Business Insider, via DNYUZ, Nov 6 |
| Round | Same terms, relayed | Dataconomy, Nov 6 |
| Seed | $2B at a $12B valuation, led by Andreessen Horowitz; Nvidia, Accel, AMD and others took part | TechCrunch, Jul 15, 2025 |
| Talks, 2025 | Early talks at about a $50B valuation | Bloomberg, Nov 13, 2025 |
| Talks, Sep 2026 | Accel in talks to lead a round of at least $1B at at least $40B; annual revenue run rate over $100M, per a source with knowledge of its financials | TechCrunch, Sep 3, 2026, on The Information |
| Talks, Sep 2026 | Round of $5–6B at at least $40B pre-money; Nvidia in talks to invest about $2.5B | The Information, via Dealroom |
| Compute | Multiyear deal for at least 1 GW of Nvidia Vera Rubin systems, deploying from early 2027, with an undisclosed Nvidia investment | TechCrunch, Mar 10, 2026 |
| Model | Inkling 2 Small: 594B parameters; priced at $0.30 input and $1.00 output per million tokens; weights not yet public | Artificial Analysis, Nov 5 |
| Model | 17B active parameters; weights to be released after external safety testing | Dataconomy, Nov 6 |
| Nvidia | Nvidia and SoftBank each put $30B into OpenAI’s $122B round, completed at an $852B valuation | Bloomberg, Mar 31, 2026 |
| Nvidia | Up to $10B in Anthropic (November 2025); up to $2B of equity in xAI’s planned $20B round (Bloomberg report, October 2025) | TechCrunch, Jan 2, 2026 |
| Anthropic | IPO valuation talk of about 18 times third-quarter revenue annualized | W.034 |
Post-money: 40 + 5 = 45; new investors’ share 5 ÷ 45 = 11.1%. Against earlier values: 45 ÷ 12 = 3.75; 40 ÷ 12 = 3.33; 40 ÷ 50 − 1 = -20%. Run-rate multiples: 40 ÷ 0.1 = 400×; 45 ÷ 0.1 = 450×; 45 ÷ 0.3 = 150×. Equity raised: 2 + 5 = 7. The seed is reported as $12B (TechCrunch) and as “more than $10B” (Business Insider); $10B before the $2B and $12B after it would reconcile the two. Nvidia’s about $2.5B would be about 50% of a $5B round; it comes from a September report and is not in the November one.
Wire reports are written within hours of the news, on a six-hour schedule. Each lists its sources and shows the arithmetic behind its figures. Not investment advice.