AI-named company formation, across countries

2026 is on track for a record year

Through 31 May the UK had already formed 1,772 AI-named companies. Holding the Jan-to-May pace relative to 2025, that projects to about 5,097 for the full year, up 40% on 2025's 3,639, roughly 1 in 158 of all new companies. Bars are full calendar years; 2026's solid block is actual-to-date and the lighter block is the projected remainder. The projection just assumes the rest of 2026 holds the Jan-to-May pace, so it is an estimate, not a forecast. Fable 5 launched 9 June, just after the data cutoff.

All 14 projected countries are set to exceed their 2025 total (13 of 14 on current pace). Countries whose 2026 register coverage does not yet reach May (Singapore, and stale registers like Romania and Thailand) are not projected, rather than shown as a false decline. Projection method: full-2025 count times the Jan-to-May 2026-vs-2025 ratio.

AI-named company formation is rising across every country

Each country's annual AI-named company formations, indexed to its 2018 level (= 100) so trajectories compare despite very different sizes. Grey lines are the 15 charted countries; a few large markets are highlighted. The synchronised takeoff is in 2023, just after ChatGPT.

The same uphill trend, country by country

Every country with a real cohort, its AI-named company formations per year, ordered by how much they grew from 2022 to 2025 (the multiple). Each panel is auto-scaled to its own range so the shape is visible; the dashed line marks ChatGPT (end 2022). The climb repeats almost everywhere.

AI as a share of all new companies, 2022 vs 2025

The rigorous cut: AI-named companies as a share of all new companies that year, which controls for general company-formation booms. Shown only for countries where we hold the full register, on a companies-only basis so levels are comparable. The dashed line marks 1 in 200 (0.5%).

Relative increase in AI's share of new companies (2022 to 2025)

How many times higher AI's share of new companies is in 2025 than in 2022. This is the like-for-like relative rise, independent of how large each country's economy or register is.

Norway, Sweden, Singapore, Latvia and Australia are restricted to incorporated companies (their registers also list sole traders).

A similar mix everywhere: most countries land near 30% in Anthropic's most-exposed occupations

For the enriched countries, the share of AI-named companies whose product maps to an occupation Anthropic ranks most AI-exposed. Most cluster between 28 and 33 percent across very different economies and growth rates. Argentina and Latvia run lower, Czechia higher. (Canada federal and Ukraine are pending website enrichment.)

By country