Can governance after Anthropic's IPO truly safeguard its safety mission?

Drawing on the prospectus Anthropic publicly filed before its listing, author Kevin Frazier breaks down its Long-Term Benefit Trust (LTBT), public benefit corporation (PBC) structure and founder shareholding provisions clause by clause, questioning whether these arrangements can truly constrain the company to hold to its safety mission after listing. The LTBT holds one Class T share and, after listing, has the right to elect 4 of 7 directors; the seven co-founders will form a Founder LLC at listing, and through one Class F share hold 50.1% of the vote on key shareholder matters. The author identifies two paths for modifying the trust and board powers: one requires approval by the trust's trustees together with 80% of board seats; the other allows shareholders meeting a threshold to proceed without trustee consent. In the first three years after the IPO, the latter requires passage by three parties: the Founder LLC, a majority of Class E employee shares and a majority of Class A; after the third year the employee threshold rises to 75%, and once the founder sunset clause takes effect, 85% of outstanding Class A shares is required.