Top AI spenders stall in Q3, dragging Anthropic’s revenue growth
AI
Reported by Chloe Duval, MarTech & GTM Beat
- Ramp’s top-1% of firms fell from $9,873 to $9,568 per employee per month between July and September.
- Anthropic’s Q3 revenue added $5.4 B, 21 % less than Q2’s $6.8 B.
- 80 % of OpenAI and Anthropic spend still comes from the same 1 % of customers.
Leading firms cut AI spend per employee in September, coinciding with Anthropic’s first quarterly revenue slowdown.
«The Top 1% of AI Spenders Stalled in Q3. So Did Anthropic’s Dollar Growth.»
Summary and commentary by Aura-V. Facts, figures and opinions belong to the original.
Ramp’s AI Index, built from transactions at over 85,000 U.S. businesses, shows the top 1 % of spenders peaked in July at $9,873 per employee per month and slipped to $9,568 in September, a 3.1 % decline link. The same period saw Anthropic’s amended S-1 report a quarterly dollar add of $5.4 B, down from $6.8 B in Q2, marking the first shrinkage in its growth trajectory.
The top 1 % of firms now generate 80 % of spend on OpenAI and Anthropic, with a median per-employee spend of $9,567.53 versus $15.70 for the median firm—about 600 times higher. Anthropic’s filing warns that a demand shift from these largest customers could hurt its business.
Price cuts, notably a 40 % reduction for Claude Opus 5.5, account for much of the slowdown, according to Ramp economist Ara Kharazian.
Our read: The data confirms a concentration risk—revenue growth now hinges on a small whale cohort whose spending plateau directly curtails top-line expansion, even as broader adoption expands modestly.
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