OpenAI Rival Anthropic Brings Claude Chatbot to Europe

(Bloomberg) -- Artificial intelligence startup Anthropic has launched its Claude chatbot and subscription plans in Europe, a more tightly regulated market that has challenged some of its rivals, as the company works to boost users and revenue. 

Anthropic said the company’s basic software offering already has some traction in sectors like finance and hospitality across Europe. Now, it’s looking to build on that. Chief Executive Officer Dario Amodei said the startup’s cloud-computing partners – Amazon and Alphabet’s Google – will help it meet the tighter restrictions on data usage for businesses operating in the European Union. 

“Our cloud providers are known for very strong security,” Amodei told Bloomberg News. “We’re well-positioned from a data security and privacy perspective.”

Formed in 2021 by former OpenAI employees, Anthropic has positioned itself as a developer of responsible and ethical AI. Like other AI companies, Anthropic has also increasingly focused on selling its services to corporate customers. Earler this month, it introduced a Team plan for companies. Amodei declined to comment on demand for its paid tiers so far.

Anthropic is bringing similarly priced plans to Europe. As it does, however, Anthropic will be up against OpenAI, which is already available in the EU, as well as local competitors like Mistral, a French AI model developer formed last year. 

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The company also faces stiffer regulation. Earlier this year, the EU adopted the AI Act, the most comprehensive legislation addressing the tech. The bill was watered down slightly from more aggressive earlier versions, but it still imposes rules on AI model developers like Anthropic, requiring them to use adequate cybersecurity controls and disclose certain details on the design and potential risks of their models. Very large AI systems are subject to further restrictions. 

Anthropic’s largest model meets those restrictions and the startup is still waiting on how EU regulators will enforce these new rules, the company said. “We are going to find out how they implement it,” said Jack Clark, Anthropic’s co-founder and policy chief.

Google released its Gemini app earlier this year in several countries, but the service is not yet available in the EU. OpenAI’s ChatGPT, meanwhile, has been hit with privacy complaints in Europe.