Hg Deepens Anthropic Partnership to Bring Agentic AI Across Software Portfolio
Technology investor Hg is expanding its collaboration with Anthropic as it looks to accelerate the use of agentic artificial intelligence across its portfolio of software and services companies.
The new strategic initiative will see Hg Catalyst, the investor’s AI product incubator, work directly with Anthropic to deploy Claude’s agentic AI capabilities across portfolio businesses, with a focus on turning emerging AI technology into measurable commercial results.
The move builds on a relationship between the two companies dating back to early 2024 and comes as Hg reports more than 1,600 live AI projects across its portfolio.
According to Hg, those projects now represent more than $260 million in budgeted EBITDA impact – around five times the level recorded when its collaboration with Anthropic began.
Moving Agentic AI Into Real-World Workflows
Hg was among the earlier private equity businesses to establish a direct relationship with a frontier AI developer.
Over the past three years, the organisations have collaborated on initiatives including AI hackathons, employee training and AI deployments within Hg-backed companies.
The latest phase of the relationship is intended to go further, with Hg Catalyst and Anthropic exploring how AI agents can be integrated into operational and product workflows to produce measurable business outcomes.
Agentic AI differs from conventional generative AI applications by giving AI systems greater ability to carry out multi-stage tasks, interact with software and data, and work towards defined objectives with varying degrees of autonomy.
For Hg, the opportunity is particularly relevant because many of its portfolio companies provide software platforms that act as systems of record within specialist industries.
Combining those established systems and workflows with AI agents could allow businesses to automate more complex processes rather than limiting AI to standalone tools such as chatbots and content-generation applications.
Hg says it first began investing in AI capabilities around a decade ago and has subsequently developed a substantial dedicated AI value-creation operation within private equity.
AI Strategies Already Emerging Across Portfolio
The investor says its approach is already producing examples of AI being embedded directly into the products of portfolio companies.
Quantios, a SaaS provider serving the global trust and corporate services industry, launched its first agentic AI solution in March 2026 with support from Hg Catalyst. The launch came ahead of Hg’s exit from the company to Vista Equity Partners.
Hg also pointed to GTreasury, which was acquired by Ripple, and Intelerad, acquired by GE HealthCare, as examples of technology businesses where product-focused AI strategies have formed part of their wider development.
The investor believes credible embedded AI capabilities are becoming increasingly important as software companies seek to differentiate their products and demonstrate how artificial intelligence can generate practical value for customers.
Steve Batchelor and JB Brian, Co-CEOs of Hg, commented:
“Hg backed the shift toward agentic AI early, and the relationship we have built with Anthropic is central to that. As AI reshapes how software businesses build and compete, we want our portfolio companies to have a direct line to the frontier and are excited to continue to deepen our relationship with Anthropic.”
Anthropic Highlights Safety for Critical AI Workflows
Anthropic’s Claude technology has increasingly been positioned for business applications where AI systems need to work with complex information, software tools and organisational processes.
The companies say safety will also be an important element of the expanded collaboration, particularly as businesses begin allowing AI agents to interact with more important operational workflows.
Guillaume Princen, Head of International, Digital Native Businesses at Anthropic, commented:
“Agentic AI is transforming how people scale software businesses. With Claude, Hg’s portfolio gets frontier agentic AI, but also the highest safety standards so they can trust agents with critical workflows. We’re excited to work with Hg to keep driving further transformation across both their own business, as well as the portfolio companies they work with.”
Private Equity Turns Its Attention to Agentic AI
The expanded partnership reflects the wider shift taking place across the enterprise technology sector, where attention is moving from experimentation with generative AI towards systems capable of performing increasingly sophisticated business tasks.
For private equity investors, that creates opportunities both to improve internal productivity and to develop new AI-enabled products within portfolio companies.
Hg currently has more than $110 billion in assets under management and employs more than 400 people across Europe and North America.
Its portfolio includes around 60 businesses with an aggregate enterprise value of more than $195 billion. Collectively, the companies employ more than 140,000 people, with Hg reporting annual revenue growth across the portfolio of more than 16%.
The closer relationship with Anthropic is intended to give those businesses more direct access to developments in frontier AI as software companies consider how autonomous and semi-autonomous agents could reshape their products, operations and customer services.
