AI creates new billionaires, some are only 25 years old

High-profile funding rounds from high-profile companies like Anthropic, Safe Superintelligence, OpenAI, Anysphere, and many others have generated huge estimated fortunes and set new valuation records.

According to CB Insights, there are currently 498 AI unicorns, or AI startups valued at $1 billion or more, with a total asset value of $2.7 trillion. Of these, 100 AI unicorns were founded since 2023. CB Insights added that there are currently more than 1,300 AI startups valued at over $100 million.

With the soaring stock prices of listed companies such as Nvidia, Meta, and Microsoft, the boom in infrastructure companies building data centers and computing power, and attractive compensation for AI engineers, this field is creating momentum for increasing personal assets on a scale far exceeding previous technology waves.

Principal researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Andrew McAfee said the AI wave is helping people build assets at the fastest speed and largest scale in the past 100 years.

In March 2025, Bloomberg News estimated that the world’s four largest private AI companies had created at least 15 billionaires with a combined net worth of about $38 billion. Since then, more than 10 new unicorns have emerged.

Mira Murati, former chief technology officer of OpenAI, left the company in September 2024 and founded Thinking Machines Lab in February 2025. By July 2025, the company had raised $2 billion, marking the largest funding round in history, valuing the company at $12 billion.

Anthropic AI is currently in talks to raise $5 billion, at a valuation of $170 billion, nearly three times what it was valued at in March 2025. If the deal goes through, CEO Dario Amodei and his six founders could join the ranks of billionaires.

Anysphere was valued at $9.9 billion in its June funding round, but just weeks later the proposed valuation for the company was increased to $18 billion to $20 billion, paving the way for founder and CEO Michael Truell to become a billionaire at the age of 25.

However, much of the wealth created in AI is currently tied to unlisted companies, making it difficult for shareholders and founders to realize profits.

Unlike the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s, when a slew of companies went public, AI startups today can stay private longer thanks to abundant funding from venture capital funds, sovereign wealth funds, and other tech investors.

In addition, the secondary market is growing rapidly, creating opportunities for shareholders in private companies to sell shares, collect cash, make a repurchase offer or borrow against shares.

The AI wave is currently concentrated mainly in the San Francisco Bay Area, reminiscent of the dot-com boom. In 2024, Silicon Valley companies raised more than $35 billion in venture capital.

According to statistics, San Francisco now has 82 billionaires, more than New York with 66 people. The number of millionaires in the Bay Area has doubled in the past decade, while New York increased by 45%.

Mr. McAfee, co-director of the Digital Economy Initiative at MIT, said that Silicon Valley was once considered "overdue" but until now it is still the center of technological innovation.