Anthropic Acquires Stainless: SDK Toolchains Are Becoming the New Moat for AI Companies
On May 18, Anthropic announced the acquisition of Stainless—an infrastructure company that builds SDKs, documentation, and MCP servers for APIs. This is not merely a technical acquisition; it is a signal that AI companies are battling for control over the developer ecosystem. Whoever controls the SDK controls the developer's first point of contact.