Anthropic acquires Vercept AI startup to accelerate computer-use agents after Meta poached founder

Anthropic Acquires Vercept to Enhance Claude's Computer-Use Capabilities

Anthropic announced Wednesday that it has acquired Vercept, a Seattle-based AI startup focused on computer-use AI agents capable of automating complex desktop tasks 1

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. The acquisition marks Anthropic's second major deal in three months, following its December purchase of coding agent engine Bun to help scale Claude Code 1

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. Vercept had created tools for more complex agentic capabilities, including its flagship product Vy, a computer-use agent in the cloud that could operate a remote Apple Macbook 1

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. As part of the deal, Anthropic is shuttering Vercept's product on March 25, giving customers 30 days to migrate to Claude's tools 2

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The acquisition will help Anthropic advance its computer use features, enabling Claude to complete multi-step tasks inside live applications, including navigating spreadsheets and managing workflows across multiple tools 2

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. Vercept's team has "spent years thinking carefully about how AI systems can see and act within the same software humans use every day," Anthropic stated, noting that "expertise maps directly onto some of the hardest problems we're working on" 2

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. The timing aligns with Anthropic's recent unveiling of Claude Sonnet 4.6, described as the company's best model yet for computer usage 3

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High-Profile Backing and Allen Institute for AI Roots

Vercept CEO Kiana Ehsani revealed in a LinkedIn post that the AI startup had raised more than $50 million in total funding 2

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. The company closed a $16 million seed round in January 2025, valuing it at $67 million post-money, with San Francisco-based Fifty Years leading the financing alongside Point Nine Capital and the AI2 Incubator 2

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. Seth Bannon, founder of Fifty Years, served as lead investor and board member 1

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The angel investor list was particularly impressive, featuring former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Google DeepMind chief scientist Jeff Dean, Cruise founder Kyle Vogt, and Dropbox co-founder Arash Ferdowsi 1

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. Despite this high-profile backing, Vercept stayed lean with just 20 employees according to LinkedIn 2

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The startup was a graduate of Seattle's AI-focused incubator A12, which spawned from the Allen Institute for AI 1

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. Vercept's founding team included former AI2 researchers, with CEO Ehsani serving as a senior researcher at AI2 where she led work on robotics and embodied AI 2

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. Co-founder Luca Weihs was a former AI2 research manager who worked on AI agents and reinforcement learning, while Ross Girshick is a computer vision pioneer who has also spent time at Meta AI 2

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Meta Poaches Co-Founder in $250 Million Deal

Not all of Vercept's co-founders are joining Anthropic in this acqui-hire. Matt Deitke, another Vercept co-founder known for leading AI2 projects including Molmo and Objaverse, left in mid-2025 after Meta reportedly offered him $250 million over four years to join its Superintelligence Lab 2

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. The massive compensation package was part of a flurry of high-profile talent acquisitions by Meta at the time . On Wednesday, Deitke congratulated his former colleagues in a post on X .

Oren Etzioni, who has been named as a co-founder of Vercept and investor in the startup, is also not joining Anthropic . Etzioni, well known in Seattle as the founding leader of the Allen Institute for AI and a professor at the University of Washington, expressed disappointment about the outcome . He posted on LinkedIn: "After a little bit more than a year, Vercept is throwing in the towel and giving their customers 30 days to get off the platform. Sad" 3

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Public Investor Dispute Reveals High Stakes

A public spat erupted on LinkedIn between Etzioni and lead investor Bannon following the acquisition announcement. Etzioni accused Bannon of being "partly responsible" for Vercept not hiring the correct business people 1

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. He alleged that the startup's board was led by Bannon and CEO Ehsani who had "zero experience" 3

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. Bannon condemned Etzioni's remarks, replying: "you disparaged the heroic work of the founders for achieving an outcome most could only dream of" 1

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Despite his public disappointment, Etzioni confirmed the deal provided a positive return for investors. He told GeekWire: "I'm pleased to have gotten a positive return but obviously disappointed that after just a little over a year with so much traction, and such a fantastic team, we're basically throwing in the towel" 2

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. The underlying motivation is notable as the stakes remain high to build the next-big AI winner, and now a promising startup that raised a decently sized warchest will be tucked into Anthropic 1

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Strategic Move to Automate Multi-Step Tasks

The founders joining Anthropic appear optimistic about the deal. In her LinkedIn post announcing the acquisition, Ehsani described the decision as mission-driven rather than financial, saying Vercept had a "comfortable runway and a successful product" when the opportunity emerged 2

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. "The choices were clear: we could build independently and work toward the same vision as two separate versions of it, or join forces with an incredible team and accelerate that vision into reality," she explained 1

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Vercept's flagship application Vy used artificial intelligence to "see" and understand screen elements much like a human does, enabling users to instruct it via natural language or demonstrations to automate repetitive tasks such as data entry, producing video content, or organizing files 2

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. This AI computer interface technology aligns directly with Anthropic's Claude Cowork desktop application, which can interact with files, browse the web, and run user-created plugins 4

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Competition Intensifies for AI Agents for Task Automation

The Vercept acquisition positions Anthropic to compete more aggressively in the rapidly evolving space of AI agents for task automation. Claude Cowork faces competition from OpenAI, whose recent hire of OpenClaw's creator signals similar ambitions 4

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. Perplexity AI also entered the space, introducing Perplexity Computer, an agentic automation tool that can summarize documents and generate code, with some features powered by Anthropic's flagship Claude 4.6 Opus model 4

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A recent update to Claude Cowork caused significant market reaction when Anthropic released more than a half dozen plugins designed to automate common tasks across fields such as sales and project management, leading to billions of dollars in market value losses for software companies with competing products 4

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. Financial terms of the Vercept transaction were not disclosed, though Anthropic clearly wanted these researchers, perhaps especially with another of them now at Meta .