Anthropic in Talks to Raise $30 Billion at $900 Billion Value

Summary

---

Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast: Anthropic in Talks to Raise $30 Billion at $900 Billion Value

Date: May 13, 2026
Hosts: Paul Sweeney, Scarlet Fu
Key Guests: Ed Ludlow (Bloomberg BTECH anchor), Tarun Rossoni (CEO, Groove AI), Ned Sigel (Chief of Housing and Economic Development, San Francisco)

---

Episode Overview

This episode delves into the explosive growth of Anthropic, an AI startup reportedly in talks to raise $30 billion at a staggering $900 billion valuation — a move that could make it the world’s most valuable startup. The hosts explore the implications for the AI and tech investing landscape, the shifting IPO pipeline (with a focus on heavyweights like SpaceX), and broader trends in AI adoption, infrastructure, and regional economic revitalization, particularly in San Francisco.

---

Anthropic’s Monumental Valuation & AI Startup Rivalry

[01:53] On Air with Ed Ludlow

• Context: Anthropic is negotiating a private funding round of up to $35 billion, which could place its value above $900 billion, potentially surpassing OpenAI.
• Roller Coaster Negotiations: For weeks, Anthropic turned down persistent investor interest—"Its investors were like kicking down the door saying let us give you some money and here's how we think you should be valued" (Ed Ludlow, [02:24]).
• Change of Course: This week, Anthropic now sees private funding making sense. The deal “could close even by the end of May. It would be the world's most valuable startup... more valuable than OpenAI, which is a good bit of rivalry to be covering" (Ed Ludlow, [02:54]).

---

The Surging IPO Pipeline: AI, SpaceX, Cerebras

[03:14] IPO Prospects and Market Dynamics

• AI IPO Pipeline: Discussion of the hot IPO landscape, with upcoming listings such as Cerebras (potential $35B valuation). But the market is really waiting on a "blockbuster" like SpaceX.
• Strategic Choices for AI Companies: Ed notes that companies like Anthropic may not need to go public if the private market provides liquidity: "why bother going public? ... if the private markets can supply you the liquidity that you need to fund your operations and invest in the compute that you need. No point" (Ed Ludlow, [04:25]).
• Three-way Race: SpaceX, OpenAI, Anthropic are all potential trillion-dollar IPOs—but “there is not infinite liquidity” for large-cap IPOs in a single year.

[05:42] SpaceX’s Timing

• Confidential filings suggest a SpaceX IPO could come as soon as late June or July ([05:49]).
• Beyond Musk: "Remember, like, look past Elon Musk a little bit. SpaceX has got talent beyond him… The CFO Brent Johnson ... as does Jared Virtual, who's like Elon's sort of private finance guy..." (Ed Ludlow, [06:12]).

---

AI’s Real Estate and Infrastructure Boom

[09:20] At the Eisner Amber West Coast Real Estate Summit

• Guest: Tarun Rossoni, CEO of Groove AI.
• From Experiments to Deployment: Tarun stresses shifting enterprises from “AI experimentation” to “full-scale deployment,” focusing on security, privacy, trust, and governance ([10:01]).
  • "Security, privacy, trust and governance are very important parameters before you get into AI adoption." (Tarun Rossoni, [10:01])
• Message to Real Estate Investors: AI’s rapid growth means "a lot of demand and needs for these AI inference data centers... in the next three to five years," especially for edge computing near major cities ([10:46]).
• Who’s Involved? "At the board level, every board is talking about AI right now. ... At the C level, every CEO's first concern is, is this something I can trust?" (Tarun Rossoni, [11:47])
• Infrastructure Geography: Traditional data centers have been placed where power is cheap (not California), but as demand for AI inference grows, there will be a need for more local clusters to serve user demand ([13:05]).
• Security Imperative:
  • Most companies "are not" using AI to improve their security — a key first step recommended by Groove ([13:57]).

Notable Quote:

"AI is only going to grow from here and it is very real. And every enterprise is going to adopt AI at a much faster pace than they did with the Internet, than they did with the mobile, than they did with the cloud."
— Tarun Rossoni, [14:26]

---

Revitalizing San Francisco: Innovation, Business, and Housing

[18:34] A City Rebounds with Tech

• Guest: Ned Sigel, San Francisco’s Chief of Housing and Economic Development.
• First Priorities: Cleaning up the city, ensuring safety, addressing mental health and drug crises—"clean and safe...that's foundational to so many of the things that we do, whether it's for a company or for a family" (Ned Sigel, [19:17]).
• Permitting Reforms: Making it easier to open/run businesses, from ending unnecessary permits (e.g., logo painting, outdoor seating) to passing 20 pieces of legislation aimed at cutting red tape ([20:23]).
  • “If you want to paint your logo on the window of your store, you don't need a permit anymore. ... if you want to put tables and chairs outside your bar or restaurant, you don't need to come see us once a year” (Ned Sigel, [20:43])
• AI at the Heart of SF’s Economy: “It really is right here in San Francisco. ... their employees are living here. ... we’re also asking them to be a part of helping San Francisco realize its potential” (Ned Sigel, [22:11]).
• Economic Linkages: The foundational tasks for small businesses and families are directly tied to business attraction and economic growth ([23:11]).
• Affordability & Growth: Introduced “Family zoning” and greater housing density measures. “If a city isn't growing, it's dying. ... we need a roadmap for people to build against and that will ladder up to affordability over time.” (Ned Sigel, [24:28])

---

Memorable Moments & Quotes

• On Private vs. Public Funding:
  “No point [going public]. There's also the kind of idea that we're in a three line race between SpaceX, open air and Anthropic to all go public in a single calendar year.”
  — Ed Ludlow, [04:25]

• On Rapid AI Adoption:
  "The sooner you start, the more compounding benefits you derive out of AI."
  — Tarun Rossoni, [11:47]

• On Regulatory Red Tape:
  "We've passed 20 pieces of legislation to make it easier to build housing and to start or run a small business."
  — Ned Sigel, [20:23]

---

Key Takeaways

• Anthropic’s rise is dramatic and could redefine the pecking order among AI startups. Its private valuation chase reflects immense investor eagerness and signals how top AI companies may not need public markets for capital.
• San Francisco remains the global hub for AI innovation, drawing new energy and investment, but faces tests in translating that momentum into city-wide economic revitalization.
• Enterprise AI deployment is at a tipping point, with security, governance, and infrastructure rapidly becoming the central challenges for businesses.
• The landscape for IPOs is crowded and competitive, with companies, investors, and markets navigating whether historic-scale offerings like those anticipated from SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic can all succeed in the same year.

---

Timestamps for Major Segments

• [01:53] Anthropic’s funding talks and private valuation race
• [03:14] IPO market & Cerebras, SpaceX discussion
• [09:20] AI infrastructure and real estate with Tarun Rossoni
• [18:34] San Francisco’s rebound and business climate with Ned Sigel

---

This episode offers a timely, high-energy look at the intersection of AI technology, finance, and urban renewal—anchored by candid expert insights and spanning both boardroom strategy and street-level reality.

Transcript

[Host 1]

Is your multi entity management creating more confusion than clarity? You need the Intuit ERP Intuit Enterprise Suite. It's the AI native ERP solution that's powerful, painless and proven. Learn [e-mail] ERP Everyone has been there. Your team's feedback is scattered across emails, chats and sticky notes. It's a mess, but PDF spaces and Adobe Acrobat gives you one collaborative workspace to streamline every file and comment. So so if you need six departments to finally agree on a proposal, do that with Acrobat. Need to turn a mountain of feedback into one plan of action. Do that with Acrobat Want to stop searching for files and finally get everyone on the same page. Do that do that do that with Acrobat. Learn [e-mail] do that with Acrobat Small businesses are the pulse of every community. They bring people together, create opportunities and drive growth. Chase for Business helps business owners like you with personalized guidance and convenient digital tools all in one place. With that guidance and your determination, you can take your business farther and help build a brighter future for your community. Learn [e-mail] business chase for business make more of what's yours the Chase Mobile app is available for select mobile devices. Message and data rates may apply JP Morgan Chase Bank Naomi Member FDIC Copyright 2026 JPMorgan Chase Co.

[Host 2]

Bloomberg Audio Studios Podcasts Radio news. You're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us live weekdays at 10am Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube.

[Host 1]

Just down the street from us in our San Fr Francisco bureau is Ed Ludlow. He is our BTECH anchor. We tried to convince him to walk over, I know, but I think he, you know, has to get ready for his own show coming up. So Ed is joining us right now from our San Francisco bureau. And Ed, the big story here in the Bay Area in Silicon Valley is anthropic, the AI startup in talks to raise $30 billion that would give it a $900 billion valuation. I mean, this company just gets bigger and bigger and more and more valuable every time we talk about it.

[Ed Ludlow]

It's been a bit of a roller coaster in the sense that the story started with Anthropic basically rebuffing its investors. Its investors were like kicking down the door saying let us give you some money and here's how we think you should be valued. And they just weren't interested for quite a number of weeks. Until this week where this is like a real live situation. They kind of accept that the idea of raising 30 to $35 billion makes sense right now through the private markets. And you know, the discussions are around a $900 billion valuation, but probably a fair bit higher than that. Which if it happens, you know, we're reporting it could close even by the end of May. It would be the world's most valuable startup. But if you're keeping track, it would mean it would be more valuable than Open Air, which is a good bit of rivalry to be covering.

[Host 3]

Ed, after the show's over, I'm going to cruise on over to Sand Hill Road, see some of my buddies there. I want to talk to them about IPOs. I mean talk to us about the IPO pipeline. For all you guys out here. This is going to be a big, big year potentially.

[Ed Ludlow]

Yeah. So much time spent down Sandhill Road. It's not just like the VCs and they like mutual funds, late stage private growth equity. But like if you are cruising and you're using a Tesla full self driving or you can almost go that far in a waymo actually then the people you meet there are really interesting and they all have skin in the game around the IPO this week, which is Cerebras. Right. And you know, evaluation around $35 billion. It's been a real hot ticket. It will be the biggest IPO of the year so far in terms of dollars raised. But you know, the problem that Cerebrus will have is that we're waiting on Space X and it's very difficult for the market to look past that one. That's likely to be late June or July.

[Host 1]

To what extent are these companies looking at market conditions when they consider listing? Because for every other company that's would be paramount. But I mean it feels like we're talking about a economy entirely for these companies.

[Ed Ludlow]

Yeah, sometimes it's really important to say like we just don't know, it's not in the reporting. But if you take Anthropic as an example, we had reported that they would go public in October of this year. Now they're raising a big chunk of change in the private markets and the sort of broader story was like why bother going public? Right. If the private markets can supply you the liquidity that you need to fund your operations and invest in the compute that you need. No point. There's also the kind of idea that we're in a three line race between SpaceX, open air and Anthropic to all go public in a single calendar year. And like Paul, you'll know there is not infinite liquidity, but for people that matter to participate in three IPOs at that scale, probably. So the reason I say we don't know is, you know, maybe anthropic is not going to go in October now, maybe it's next year. Maybe everyone's waiting on Space X to see if at that scale, Anthropic or OpenAI could pull off an IPO at a valuation that's north of $1 trillion or whatever it ends up being. And with those two in particular, Scarlet, like, really interesting point. There's the Public Benefit Corporation or the charitable arm of each, which complicates the structure of an ipo, which hasn't really been worked out yet, as far as I know.

[Host 3]

Ed, for better or worse, you are the elon Musk whisperer. SpaceX. Oh, God. Talk to us about the timing of that potential ipo.

[Ed Ludlow]

Yeah, I mean, you know, we wrote the story first week of May. I believe that they had filed confidentially. And, you know, if we were right about that, which I'm sure we were, then that S1. Or that that filing will be made public by the SEC very, very soon, very soon, in a matter of days. So they could do it in late mid to late June. But, you know, again, timing is everything. And, you know, as we speak, you know, there will be ongoing conversations with, with investors. But remember, like, look past Elon Musk a little bit. SpaceX has got talent beyond him. And, you know, the CFO Brent Johnson handles a lot of that when shot. Well, the president handles a lot of that, as does Jared Virtual, who's like Elon's sort of private finance guy and straddles all his companies. So, you know, it's all in the works.

[Host 1]

Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Intelligence coming up after this. If your finance team spends more time finding data than using it. If there's one entity here and one here and one here and one here. If scaling your business feels like starting over, you need the Intuit ERP. Intuit Enterprise Suite is the AI native ERP solution that's powerful, painless, and proven. Learn more at intuit.com erp Support for

[Host 3]

the show comes from public. Lately it feels like there are two types of investing platforms. Some are traditional brokerages that haven't changed much in decades, and others feel less like investing and more like a game. Public is positioned differently. It's an investing platform for people who are serious about building their wealth on public. You can build a portfolio of stocks, options, bonds, crypto without all the bugs or the confetti. Retirement accounts? Yep. High yield cash? Yes again. They even have direct indexing. Public has modern design, powerful tools and customer support that actually helps go to public.com market and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com market ad paid for by Public Holdings Brokerage Services by Public Investing Member FINRA SIPC Advisory Services by Public Advisors SEC Registered Advisor crypto services by ZeroHash all investing involves risk of loss. See complete [e-mail] disclosures being a small

[Host 1]

business owner isn't just a career, it's a calling. Chase for Business knows how much heart and effort go into building something of your own. That's why they make business growth their priority. The Chase team takes the time to understand your mission, where you are now and where you want to go. Their broad range of solutions is designed with you in mind so you can bring your ideas to life. From banking to payment acceptance to credit cards, you can conveniently manage all your business finances all in one place with their digital tools. Looking for tips and advice, their online resources are always available to give you the solutions you need to help your business thrive. See how your business can get stronger and go farther with Chase for Business. Learn [e-mail] business chase for business Make More of what's Yours the Chase Mobile app is available for select mobile devices. Message and data rates. May apply JP Morgan Chase Bank Naomi Member FDIC Copyright 2026 JPMorgan Chase Co.

[Host 2]

You're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us live weekdays at 10am Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube.

[Host 3]

We are broadcasting live from the Eisner Amber West Coast Real Estate Summit in San Francisco. And out here at sf, it is all about AI. Everybody is into it. It is revitalized. This city post pandemic, which is a beautiful thing because I'm a huge fan of San Francisco. Right now we're going to check in with Tarun Rossoni, CEO at Groove AI. My notes tell me that Groove is an enterprise AI services platform that helps businesses move from AI experimentation, which is where I am, to full scale deployment. Taren, thanks so much for joining us here. How do you get your clients, the companies you deal with, from experimenting with AI to really deploying it fully in their business? What do you do there?

[Tarun Rossoni]

Thank you so much for having me here. So we help companies understand How AI adoption can be improved in their environment, thinking about security data and the underlying governance and infrastructure that they need to securely adopt AI in their environment and to adopt AI within the enterprise. Security, privacy, trust and governance are very important parameters before you get get into air adoption.

[Host 1]

So at this conference, the ISER Ambers West Coast Real Estate Summit, where there's a lot of folks in commercial real estate, there are investors or their principals, what is your message? What is the message of an AI company to these folks in the real estate industry?

[Tarun Rossoni]

Yeah, as you know, AI requires a lot of infrastructure. The underlying infrastructure is energy, data centers, a lot of compute. And the compute requirements are 100,000 x bigger. So real estate group is a very important part of this build out. And the message here is very simple. There is going to be a lot of demand and needs for these AI inference data centers that are going to grow in the next three to five years. And it is going to require us to build inference clusters at the edge, the last mile. And the edge has always been very important. So the real estate group plays a very big role in that last mile and edge.

[Host 3]

So when you talk, when you work with your clients, are you talking to like the Chief Technical officer? Are you talking to the CEO? Are you talking to the board? I mean my question is, are companies as broadly defined here, how much are they really into AI? At what level are they trying to really grasp it and attack it?

[Tarun Rossoni]

Yeah, this is a great question. So at the board level, every board is talking about AI right now. That's their biggest focus. And AI is compounding. So the sooner you start, the more compounding benefits you derive out of AI. At the C level, every CEO's first concern is is this something I can trust? Is this going to help me keep my enterprise secure? Is this going to help me take it forward? At the cto, cio, CISO level, the concerns are more around how do we make sure like our business lines, our, our service groups can adopt this very efficiently.

[Host 1]

And it's going to be at varying rates of adoption for different companies depending on how management feels about it, you know, how committed the staff is as well. But in the fiscal build out of the data centers, the infrastructure, we're in California right now, but that's not necessarily where the data centers are being built, Right? I mean it's being clustered across the country.

[Tarun Rossoni]

Yeah. So all of the data centers that have been built in the last three to five years were purely focused on energy efficiency. Where could they find the lowest cost of energy and how could they build a massive training cluster.

[Host 1]

So that's not California.

[Tarun Rossoni]

That's not definitely not California, you know. But as we go from training to inferencing, where everybody starts adopting and using more AI, that is going to require us to build these clusters very close to tier one, Tier two cities, because that is where the users are and that is where the consumption of AI is going to occur.

[Host 3]

You've mentioned security a couple of times here. I can't even imagine the security risk of AI. I mean, it's bad enough to have somebody's account hacked, but if you're going to have some of these AI agents taking over the world here, I'm thinking Arnold Schwarzenegger type stuff here. It could get bad out there. How do you think about what are the security conversations you're having with your clients?

[Tarun Rossoni]

Well, the first conversation I have with my clients is are you using AI to make your security better? And that I think is the more important part.

[Host 1]

Are they?

[Tarun Rossoni]

Majority of them are not. And that's what we do first, is we use AI to actually make your security better. And then we use security in everything you do with AI. So when you start doing that, you automatically improve the trust factor within every enterprise.

[Host 1]

If you had to give one piece of advice to the folks attending this conference, investors, developers who are trying to understand how AI fits into what they've built up, what they have been working on, what would it be?

[Tarun Rossoni]

I think the first one would be AI is only going to grow from here and it is very real. And every enterprise is going to adopt AI at a much more faster pace than they did with the Internet, than they did with the mobile, than they did with the cloud. We are at a very starting stage of this. So the infrastructure required to build this AI is going to be a massive investment. Think of it like the electrical infrastructure we build in the last hundred plus years in the world, the transport infrastructure we built in the last hundred years in the world. I should be thought of the same way in terms of the infrastructure buildup.

[Host 3]

Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Intelligence coming up after this. Support for the show comes from Public. Public is an investing platform that offers access to stocks, options, bonds and crypto. And they've also integrated AI with tools that can assist investors in building customized portfolios. One of these tools is called Generated Assets. It allows you to turn your ideas into investable indexes. So let's say you're interested in something specific like biotech companies with high R and D spend, small cap stocks with improving operating margins, or the S&P 500 minus high debt companies. Chances are there isn't an ETF that fits your exact criteria. But on Public you just type in a prompt and their AI screens thousands of stocks and builds a one of a kind index. You can even backtest it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks, go to public.com market and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com market ad paid for by Public Holdings Brokerage Services by Public Investing member FINRA SIPC Advisory Services by Public Advisors SEC Registered Advisor crypto services by ZeroHash sample prompts are for illustrative purposes only, not investment advice. All investing involves risk of loss. See complete [e-mail] disclosures being a small

[Host 1]

business owner isn't just a career, it's a calling. Chase for Business knows how much heart and effort go into building something of your own. That's why they make business growth their priority. The Chase team takes the time to understand your mission, where you are now, and where you want to go. Their broad range of solutions is designed with you in mind so you can bring your ideas to life. From banking to payment acceptance to credit cards, you can conveniently manage all your business finances all in one place with their digital tools looking for tips and advice, their online resources are always available to give you the solutions you need to help your business thrive. See how your business can get stronger and go farther with Chase for Business. Learn [e-mail] business chase for business make more of what's yours the Chase Mobile app is available for select mobile devices. Message and data rates may apply. JPMorgan Chase Bank NA Member FDIC Copyright 2026 JPMorgan Chase Co. We buy insurance

[Sponsor Voice]

for peace of mind, but every year millions of claims are denied. Not because people did anything wrong, but because their policies quietly excluded what happened. Insurers know every detail. Policyholders rarely do. That's why MyPolicyAdvocate exists for just 27 cents a day. Their platform reads your policies and explains where you are Vulner they don't sell insurance. They deliver transparency. Before you trust your policy to protect you, let my policy advocate tell you what it really says. Go to mypolicyadvocate.com

[Host 2]

youm're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us live weekdays at 10am Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business App. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube.

[Host 3]

We are broadcasting live from the EISNER Emperor. West Coast Real estate summit here in San Francisco. Before we leave, I got to give some credit to Sebastian, our technical director. Got us all set up out here in San Francisco.

[Host 1]

Smooth.

[Host 3]

So smooth. And he makes it done. But now I got to throw him under the bus big time. I come in this morning, I say, hey, wanna go make a Starbucks run? What do you want? Here we go. Listen to this. Tall Matcha. I'm already done at that point. Tall Matcha with banana cream, cold foam. Don't tell any of my boys back home that I made that.

[Host 1]

But you did.

[Host 3]

You put in the order, and it came back. It looked actually like, okay, if you like green drinks in the morning. I'm not sure how that works. But we're here in San Francisco. Happy to be here. This is one of my favorite towns, always has been. When people come from Europe and say, hey, I got three or four weeks with the family. Where am I going? I say, you do. To Vegas, the New York, whatever. You have to spend three or four days in the Bay Area, hang out in San Francisco. That's how cool this part of the world is. Ned Sigel joins us here, Chief of Housing and Economic Development for the City and county of San Francisco. Ned, thanks so much for joining us here.

[Ned Sigel]

Good morning. Thanks for having me.

[Host 3]

Tell us how, you guys, when you came into office and you looked at the city and county of San Francisco, what was your to do list to get the city back?

[Ned Sigel]

Well, first of all, San Francisco is the most beautiful city in the world.

[Sponsor Voice]

Agreed.

[Ned Sigel]

Second, we have this incredible mindset of innovation, and anything is possible with a culture that is so much bigger than our footprint of 850,000 people. And so we have all of the tools available to us to realize our potential. And the last year and a half have really been about making it easier for people to do the things that they're best at in San Francisco. Cleaning up the streets, making this a safe, great place to raise a family. And so the list always starts with clean and safe, because that's foundational to so many of the things that we do, whether it's for a company or for a family. And then we think about the mental health and drug crises on our streets, and then we think about our economy and all the things we need to do to revitalize our economy. We feel like we're on a really good start.

[Host 1]

You work very closely with the new mayor, Dan Lurie, and he has made permitting reform a big, big issue. And this has to do with how easy or in San Francisco's, case, how difficult it's been for a small business to open a business, to just be able to get stuff done. What did it look like before? What does it look like now?

[Ned Sigel]

Well, I'd say we've changed it in two ways. One is there's clearly a mindset in City hall from people who've been there for decades and those of us who've only been there for a small amount of time that we want to fix the small problems and make it easier. And that message has become crystal clear to small businesses. So they come to us with ideas. They open a business or a second store that they may not have before because they know that we're on their own side and that we're trying to help them. That mindset has helped tremendously. It's not enough, though. We've passed 20 pieces of legislation to make it easier to build housing and to start or run a small business. Now, get this. If you want to paint your logo on the window of your store, you don't need a permit anymore. I know it sounds like something you maybe didn't need a permit for before, but now you don't need a permit for it today. If you want to put tables and chairs outside your bar or restaurant, you don't need to come see us once a year when you should be at your bar or restaurant, and you don't need to pass $2,500 a year for that permit. Those are two great examples, but there's so many more of where we're just knocking down challenges that we put in front of people. These things were all there through good intent, but there were too many of them, and we're trying to remove as many of them as we can.

[Host 3]

It's funny you mentioned the outdoor dining. My cab or my Uber coming in. I did not take the Waymo. I. I tried it. Take my Uber coming in. I saw people sitting outside with the lights out in the restaurants, having some outdoor seating. We're used to that in the city. In New York City.

[Host 1]

Yes.

[Host 3]

I hadn't seen that before. Too often in San Francisco.

[Host 1]

It's kind of too cold for that

[Host 3]

for one day, you know?

[Ned Sigel]

You're telling me it's colder in San Francisco than it is in New York?

[Host 1]

Yes. Because of the year. Because of the month. Of the year. It is.

[Host 3]

No, it's, you know, the coldest winter I ever spent was the summer I spent.

[Ned Sigel]

Exactly.

[Host 3]

That's cool. Talk to us about just the business community here. AI has been such a. A big development globally, but, boy, the epicenter is right here in San Francisco, isn't it?

[Ned Sigel]

It really is right here in San Francisco. It's incredible. You can walk just a few blocks from where we are today. And those companies that you hear about changing the world, wherever you are in the world, they are right here. And their employees are living here. They are going to dinner here. They are raising families here. And the mayor, myself and others, we're also asking them to be a part of of helping San Francisco realize its potential. That means chipping in, whether it's through volunteering or contributing capital to some of the real opportunities that we see for public private partnerships as well.

[Host 1]

So it's not just office demand that gets a lot of the headlines, but it's also conventions, tourism, the visitors, economy. Paul and I are here. We're spending money at the four seasons of market. We're spending money in the city. Today we're attending the Eisner Amper West Coast Real Estate Summit. What is that like to try to get companies to get back in here and commit to building up a presence again in San Francisco? How is that different from building affordable housing and reducing the red tape for small businesses?

[Ned Sigel]

Well, it's all linked those same things that you do for small businesses or for families to make it easier to have a home, those ladder up to the work for businesses as well. Because if you run a big company and your team can't live in the city where you operate, that's hard for them. And they're going to choose to be somewhere else. If there aren't restaurants and small businesses to patronize, they're not going to have their employees come downtown, they're not going to ask them to come back five days a week. So first of all, that work is really important. But second of all, just as we were talking about small businesses where we need to be cheerleaders, we need the big companies to know that we are open for business and we're open for feedback. We're on the phone with them all the time. We're touring them around downtown hand in hand, showing them the progress that we've made and talking about the work that's still in front of us. And then we're talking about how we know we need to be principled, predictable and transparent, whether it's around our tax code or our permitting processes or what all the things that ladder up to them. Running a big successful company here, we've always been a place where people start big start companies. Over time, we tend to export those companies. We need them to be comfortable that this is a great place not just to start, but to stay for a really long time.

[Host 3]

About affordability. 30 seconds left. That's a big issue. Talk to us about how you're approaching affordability.

[Ned Sigel]

Well, we passed something called the Family zoning map in December. The mayor signed it in January. This is a roadmap to build more height on transit corridors and denser in neighborhoods. We need a lot more people to live in San Francisco. Dan Dr. Off who had a job like mine in New York, he said to me once, he said, if a city isn't growing, it's dying. And we know that we need a roadmap for people to build against and that will ladder up to affordability over time.

[Host 2]

This is the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast, available on Apple, Spotify and anywhere else you get. Your podcasts listen live each weekday 10am to noon eastern on bloomberg.com the iHeartRadio app TuneIn, and the Bloomberg Business App. You can also watch us live Every weekday on YouTube and always on the Bloomberg Terminal.

[Host 3]

When you're running a business, the best days are the ones where priorities stay on track. For midsize and large companies, risk can affect multiple parts of the organization at once, from property and liability to cyber and regulatory challenges. At that level, managing risk becomes an ongoing discipline. At the Hartford, the focus is on helping businesses manage risk before it turns into something more disruptive. And when losses do happen, that work is paired with insurance coverage shaped by years of underwriting, risk engineering and claims experience. Learn [e-mail] riskmitigation policies provided by Hartford Fire Insurance Company and its property and casualty affiliates, Hartford, Connecticut these days it

[Sponsor Voice]

seems like AI agents are just about everywhere you turn, every field and every function. But without identity, you can't trust they'll serve your business business instead of jeopardizing it. Fortunately, Okta helps you get identity right by securing your AI agents identities, giving you a single layer of control, a single standard of trust. So whether an AI agent supports a single user or your entire enterprise, with Okta you'll turn risk into opportunity. Secure every agent, Secure any agent Okta secures AI A business gift should do more than check a box. It should reflect your brand and show someone they're appreciated, recognized and truly seen. 4imprint offers thousands of high quality customizable products like premium apparel, drinkware, tech and more, making it easy to create a gift that feels meaningful and on brand. And with 4imprint's expert support and their 360 degree guarantee, you can be 4imprint certain your order will arrive exactly as intended. Explore gifting with [e-mail] forimprint for certain.