OpenAI and Anthropic Fuel California’s Record-Setting Investment Surge

California is reportedly seeing an historic wave of investment due to Silicon Valley’s artificial intelligence (AI) boom.

Companies there have taken in around $366 billion in venture capital this year, with just two artificial intelligence (AI) firms—OpenAI and Anthropic—accounting for half that total, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Thursday (Aug. 20), citing Pitchbook data.

The report said the $366 billion figure is more than three times the amount of venture capital (VC) funding that has funneled into the other 49 states this year put together, and almost double California’s previous record, set last year.

OpenAI in March raised $122 billion, the largest funding round in the history of Silicon Valley, while Anthropic has taken in $95 billion in two rounds of financing.

In all, more than 4,000 California-based startups have raised money this year, the WSJ added, again citing Pitchbook figures. Not all of them were AI companies: defense manufacturing company Hadrian Automatic raised $1.37 billion and live commerce platform Whatnot raised $545 million, both rounds announced earlier this month.

The WSJ noted that it’s not unusual for new technologies to “agglomerate”—or concentrate—around one geographic area, such as the automotive industry in Detroit. But what’s happening in Silicon Valley is a different case, economist Enrico Moretti told the WSJ.