I seriously doubt that anyone is doing much of a due diligence here. They are either counting on others to do it and just follow along OR investing some more money to keep this thing alive enough to go through the IPO.

ARR seems like a interesting concept which hides away the concrete details and is counting on a futuristic possible commitment especially for companies at this early stages. The crucial detail is probably the money being spent, that is what is fueling this sale of equity at this point.

> ARR seems like a interesting concept

Yes, it is a meaningful financial measure of actual progress, exactly where progress is most needed for a new company.

> which hides away the concrete details

A normal metric isn't a magic trick. It's just the number it is.

> The crucial detail is probably the money being spent

Accelerating (not just fast) revenue growth at an astounding rate, with absolute numbers that are enormous for a new company, bonkers for a 2500 employee startup [0], is the crucial "detail".

There are lots of companies with deep pockets and compute, making great AI efforts with teams of smart people, that would love to be doing, but are not doing, what Anthropic is doing and doing well. That might be the second crucial detail.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic