Menlo Ventures’ Matt Murphy explains what AI startups founders must do differently

Anthropic leaped to a $47 billion revenue run rate by May, compared to $9 billion in 2025. It’s the kind of growth that Menlo Ventures’ Matt Murphy says he’s never seen in 25 years of investing, not in the internet wave, not in mobile, not in the first cloud boom. Menlo led Anthropic’s $500M Series D, and Murphy has had a front-row seat as the company went from a pre-revenue, pre-launch bet to one of the most valuable startups out there.  On this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Julie Bort talks with Murphy about backing Anthropic before anyone else would, why a great model was never the point, and what’s driving the fastest-growing startups he’s ever seen.  Listen to the full episode to hear more about:  Theresa Loconsolo is an audio producer at TechCrunch focusing on Equity, the network’s flagship podcast.

Before joining TechCrunch in 2022, she was one of 2 producers at a four-station conglomerate where she wrote, recorded, voiced and edited content, and engineered live performances and interviews from guests like lovelytheband. Theresa is based in New Jersey and holds a bachelors degree in Communication from Monmouth University. You can contact or verify outreach from Theresa by emailing theresa.loconsolo@techcrunch.com. View Bio Julie Bort Venture Editor Scale faster. Grow your portfolio. Gain practical expertise. No matter your goal, Disrupt can empower you.Save up to $330 today! Jack Dorsey is taking on Slack with Buzz, a group chat platform for teams and their AI agents Light made a flip phone — it’s colorful and it’s cheap AI music generator Suno breach affects 55M users, per Have I Been Pwned Anthropic’s landmark $1.5B copyright settlement is approved Google is working on a new AI chip designed to make Gemini more efficient Coca-Cola suspended production at its Fairlife dairy after a ransomware attack Menlo Ventures’ Matt Murphy explains what AI startups founders must do differently