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Silicon Valley’s Anthropic Anxiety

At the HumanX conference in San Francisco, A.I. executives expressed both euphoria and a growing fear that the industry’s surging economics are largely flowing upward, to a small handful of mega-firms—and that enterprise use cases aren’t yet compelling enough for everyone to share the wealth.

Dario Amodei
“Our spend went up 10x from last year to this year, just on Anthropic,” Boomi C.E.O. Steve Lucas said. “Every C.E.O. I talk to—software, non-software—it’s the same.” (Indeed, several other executives also told Ian that their Anthropic bills had multiplied in recent months. Good work, Dario.) Photo: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg/Getty Images
Ian Krietzberg
April 14, 2026

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The HumanX conference is only 2 years old, but it’s already become the quintessential A.I. conference for operators, investors, and executives to discuss the industry’s breakneck momentum—and its risks. As expected, the Moscone Center in San Francisco was pulsing with energy: gaudy booths, dancing robots, fog machines, etcetera. But in my dozens of conversations with industry insiders, I detected an undertone of anxiety that wasn’t quite so palpable last year. As a number of A.I. executives pointed out, the conference floor was buzzing with salespeople and investors. Largely absent, however, were potential customers.