Anthropic, the artificial intelligence startup backed by Alphabet and Amazon, will open a new office in South Korea as part of its accelerating Asia expansion, Chief Commercial Officer Paul Smith told Reuters on Thursday. The move underscores the company’s growing global footprint and the region’s pivotal role in driving demand for its Claude AI models and coding tools.
Smith revealed that three of Anthropic’s top five global user bases are in Asia — Korea, Japan, and India — and that the region now accounts for 25% of usage of its AI coding assistant, Claude Code. South Korea alone has seen a sixfold increase in weekly active users over the past four months, making it the company’s most engaged market worldwide.
Anthropic plans to open its Seoul office in early 2026, extending a broader international strategy that includes new sites in Tokyo, Bengaluru, Dublin, London, and Zurich. The company is also seeking local partnerships in each market to strengthen enterprise support and service delivery.
Smith said Anthropic’s enterprise-focused business is expanding rapidly, with an annualized revenue run rate approaching $7 billion, and growth expected to accelerate through 2026. The firm now serves over 300,000 enterprise customers, with nearly 80% of usage outside the U.S.
Anthropic’s partnership with SK Telecom, which invested $100 million in the company in 2023, exemplifies its regional ambitions. The startup is also weighing further expansion, including a potential office in Australia, to support increasing adoption of AI systems that can perform complex, multi-step tasks for businesses.
Valued at $183 billion, Anthropic’s push into Asia positions it as a key challenger to rivals like OpenAI and Google DeepMind, as global competition in enterprise AI and autonomous software agents continues to intensify.
