Claude Code loses 3 key members in 2 weeks as Cat Wu jumps ship to OpenAI
APPSO · wechat · 2026-11-05
Cat Wu, former Claude Code product lead, joined OpenAI as PM for core products one day after announcing her Anthropic departure — the third key exit in two weeks, following desktop builder Anthony Morris and engineer Thariq Shihipar.
- Comes just before Anthropic's IPO: quarterly revenue grew 45x (from $376M in Q1 2025 to $16.96B in Q3 2026); Claude Code hit a $2.5B annualized run rate; headcount grew from 940 to 5,300 with only 1% regretted attrition — yet the S-1 flags key-talent risk.
- Cat Wu had engineer/VC/PM backgrounds (Scale AI, Dagster, Index Ventures), championed PMs building prototypes with AI, and previously briefly defected to Anysphere (Cursor) in July 2025 before returning.
- No evidence of internal conflict; the piece frames it as pre-IPO organizational churn plus AI lowering the bar for independent product building.
Related event: Former Anthropic PM Cat Wu Joins OpenAI to Lead Core Products(29 posts)→
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