Anthropic’s launch of its Sonnet 4.6 model update hones the vendor’s allegiance to enterprise AI, despite controversy over how it managed an open source agentic framework that initially supported its Claude foundation model.
On Feb. 17, the model maker introduced Sonnet 4.6 as the default model in Claude.ai, the web version of the generative AI model, and Claude Cowork for free and pro users. The updated version boasts improved coding skills, with enhancements in consistency, computer use skills, and instruction-following, according to Anthropic. The vendor said that while the model is not as good as humans in computer use, its rate of progress continues to accelerate. The model is also good at reading context before modifying code.
The release of Sonnet 4.6 comes in the wake of news last weekend that OpenAI has hired Peter Steinberger, the developer behind OpenClaw, a recently popular open source framework that enables users to build personal AI agents on their own hardware. At its launch a few months ago, OpenClaw (originally named Clawdbot) directed users to Claude Opus, urging them to run their projects with Claude 3.5. However, Anthropic asked Steinberger to stop using the Claude takeoff name, forcing him to change it to Moltbot before he settled on OpenClaw. The need to rebrand gave scammers a chance to hijack OpenClaw’s account. Moreover, it also allowed OpenAI to swoop in and hire Steinberger,, although OpenClaw will remain open source as part of a foundation at OpenAI.
A Risky Situation
The situation with OpenClaw jeopardizes Anthropic’s reputation as an enterprise-friendly vendor and — at least this week — overshadows any development the vendor has made with Sonnet, said David Nicholson, an analyst at Futurum Group.
“Anthropic was carving out a space as the enterprise AI partner to partner with over OpenAI. I would say Anthropic squandered all of that,” Nicholson said. He added that while the vendor touted agentic AI as necessary, it failed to recognize the opportunity that a framework like OpenClaw could provide to drive consumption of its services.
Moreover, the stance Anthropic took by forcing OpenClaw to change its name from Clawdbot made OpenClaw’s users more vulnerable to security risks, Nicholson said.
Therefore, while the Sonnet 4.6 release is another example of models improving, for enterprises, it does not matter, Nicholson said.
“Anthropic could have released AGI [artificial general intelligence] this week, and that news would still be overshadowed by the OpenClaw PR disaster,” he said.
More Than Models
Nevertheless, with Sonnet 4.6, Anthropic is trying to prove that it is no longer just a model maker, said Arun Chandrasekaran, an analyst at Gartner.
“Claude 4.6 (Opus and Sonnet) marks a transition from a model provider to an agentic solution for Anthropic, enabling the model to autonomously execute multi-step business workflows with good accuracy,” Chandrasekaran said. He added that by expanding its context window to one million tokens, the updated model enables enterprises to process entire codebases or legal archives with a single prompt.
Moreover, Sonnet 4.6’s support for adaptive and extended thinking on the Claude Developer platform enables enterprises to balance “high-level reasoning with cost efficiency,” Chandrasekaran added.
Integration with MCP connectors for platforms such as Excel also assures enterprises that Sonnet 4.6 can safely interact with their enterprise data, he said.
“Anthropic is clearly transitioning from a model provider to an enterprise AI applications and platform company,” Chandrasekaran said. “While they don’t have all the required capabilities yet, it is the strategic direction they are headed.”
