OpenAI Reaches $500 Billion Valuation, Becoming World's Most Valuable Startup

OpenAI completes deal at $500bn valuation

OpenAI has completed a deal that values the artificial intelligence company at $500bn, allowing it to overtake SpaceX as the world's most valuable start-up. The secondary share sale allows current and former employees of OpenAI to sell about $6.6bn of their stock, said a person close to the company. Elon Musk's SpaceX was valued at $400bn by investors in July. OpenAI was previously valued at $300bn as part of a $40bn financing led by Japan's SoftBank Group in March. Executives began discussions with investors about an employee share sale at the much higher valuation just a few months later, according to people with knowledge of the start-up's plans. The employees sold their shares to investors including Thrive Capital, SoftBank, Dragoneer Investment Group, Abu Dhabi's MGX and T Rowe Price, according to the person. The completion of the deal, which has been in discussion since August, was first reported by Bloomberg. OpenAI had allowed employees to sell up to $10bn of their shares but many elected not to sell, the person close to the company said, attributing this to employees' confidence in the future of the business. The person added there was investor appetite for more than $10bn of the shares. The share sale is the latest sign of intense appetite for exposure to AI. Investors are piling into promising start-ups in the hope that the dominant company in the field will ultimately be worth trillions of dollars. Last month, chipmaker Nvidia announced it would invest up to $100bn in OpenAI in return for the start-up deploying up to 10 gigawatts of computing capacity using Nvidia's AI chips. Since launching its ChatGPT chatbot in late 2022, OpenAI's annual recurring revenue -- a measure of expected revenue from subscriptions commonly used by start-ups -- has surged to $12bn. The company is forecasting $20bn or more in annual recurring revenue by the end of 2025, according to a person with knowledge of its finances.

OpenAI now worth $500 billion, possibly making it the world's most valuable startup

OpenAI could now be the world's most valuable startup, ahead of Elon Musk's SpaceX and TikTok's parent company ByteDance, after a secondary stock sale designed to retain employees at the ChatGPT maker. Current and former OpenAI employees sold $6.6 billion in shares to a group of investors, pushing the privately held artificial intelligence company's valuation to $500 billion, according to a source with knowledge of the deal who was not authorized to discuss it publicly. The investors buying the shares included Thrive Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group and T. Rowe Price, along with Japanese tech giant SoftBank and the United Arab Emirates' MGX, the source said Thursday. The valuation reflects high expectations for the future of AI technology and continues OpenAI's remarkable trajectory from its start as a nonprofit research lab in 2015. But with the San Francisco-based company not yet turning a profit, it could also amplify concerns about an AI bubble if the generative AI products made by OpenAI and its competitors don't meet the expectations of investors pouring billions of dollars into research and development. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has sought to dismiss those concerns, most recently last week, when he toured a massive data center complex being built to run the company's AI systems in Abilene, Texas. "Between the ten years we've already been operating and the many decades ahead of us, there will be booms and busts," Altman said after being asked about a bubble. "People will overinvest and lose money, and underinvest and lose a lot of revenue." He added that "we'll make some dumb capital allocations" and short-term ups and downs but that "over the arc that we have to plan over, we are confident that this technology will drive a new wave of unprecedented economic growth," along with scientific breakthroughs, improvements to quality of life and "new ways to express creativity." Just this week, the company launched two different business ventures, one a partnership with Etsy and Shopify for online shopping through ChatGPT and another a social media app, Sora, for generating and sharing AI videos. The stock sale is a first for OpenAI, which has been struggling to offer investors and staff the same perks and compensation as other companies. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, in particular, has been on a hiring spree for elite AI engineers and in June made a $14.3 billion investment in AI company Scale that recruited its CEO Alexandr Wang. OpenAI's for-profit subsidiary, valued at $500 billion, is technically controlled by the board of OpenAI's nonprofit and both are still bound to pursue the nonprofit's charitable purpose. OpenAI's partnerships with major companies and its plans to change its corporate structure have drawn the scrutiny of regulators, including the attorneys general of California and Delaware, who oversee charitable organizations that operate or are incorporated in their states. The company has made big deals in recent weeks with Oracle and SoftBank, its partners on a data center venture called Stargate, and with chipmaker Nvidia, which makes the specialized AI chips those data centers need. At the same time, it has lessened its reliance on longtime backer Microsoft. In September, OpenAI announced it had reached a tentative agreement with Microsoft about the future stake of its nonprofit in its for-profit corporation but released few details. It also opened applications for nonprofits to apply for $50 million in funding from OpenAI, an effort it launched in response to the recommendations of an advisory board. The grants will go toward projects that increase public understanding of AI, support the design of AI for uses that communities want and increase economic opportunity. The deadline to apply closes on Oct. 8. -- -- AP Philanthropy Writer Thalia Beaty contributed to this report.

OpenAI Finalizes Deal That Values It at $500 Billion

OpenAI has finalized a deal to sell employees' shares to investors that values the artificial intelligence company at $500 billion, said two people familiar with the agreement. The deal makes OpenAI the world's most valuable privately held company, according to data from the start-up tracker CB Insights, ousting SpaceX, the rocket company founded by Elon Musk. Current and former OpenAI employees agreed to sell roughly $6.6 billion in shares to investors, including the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank and the venture capital firm Thrive Capital, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the agreement. The news was first reported by Bloomberg. OpenAI's valuation has jumped repeatedly over the last 12 months, from $157 billion last October to $300 billion in March. The start-up has raised billions of dollars from investors like Microsoft, the chipmaker Nvidia, SoftBank and Thrive as it works to build A.I. technologies like the online chatbot ChatGPT. In March, OpenAI reached an agreement with SoftBank and other investors for a funding round to raise $40 billion by the end of the year. But SoftBank has the right to slash the funds it has already committed to the start-up if OpenAI does not complete a complex corporate restructuring it has been working toward since last year. Explore Our Coverage of Artificial Intelligence Top A.I. Researchers Leave OpenAI, Google and Meta for New Start-Up Why Don't Data Centers Use More Green Energy? Countries Consider A.I.'s Dangers and Benefits at U.N. OpenAI to Join Tech Giants in Building 5 New Data Centers in U.S. Meta Ramps Up Spending on A.I. Politics With New Super PAC A.I. Fighter Jets and Cockroach Spies: Inside the Changing Business of War What We Know About ChatGPT's New Parental Controls The New AirPods Can Translate Languages in Your Ears. This Is Profound. With the Em Dash, A.I. Embraces a Fading Tradition Mr. Musk, who helped found OpenAI before leaving the organization in 2018 after a tussle for control, has also sued OpenAI and its chief executive, Sam Altman, in an effort to prevent the restructuring. Late last month, Nvidia said it intended to invest $100 billion in OpenAI over the next several years. Nvidia has made an initial investment of $10 billion at OpenAI's current valuation of $500 billion, according to a person familiar with the agreement. This gives Nvidia a roughly 2 percent stake in OpenAI. The Nvidia investment was another example of OpenAI raising money from companies it has relied on for products and services. Microsoft, which invested more than $13 billion in OpenAI from 2019 to 2023, made billions of dollars after the start-up paid it for the massive amounts of computing power needed to build and deliver technologies like ChatGPT. (The New York Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft in 2023 for copyright infringement of news content related to A.I. systems. The two companies have denied those claims.)

OpenAI Is Now Worth More on Paper Than SpaceX, Catches Up to Elon Musk Himself

The ChatGPT maker is now the most valuable private company in the world. OpenAI just surpassed SpaceX to become the world’s most valuable private company, and now it’s worth about as much as its mortal enemy and the richest man in the world, Elon Musk. Bloomberg reports that OpenAI finalized a deal involving the company’s current and former employees selling about $6.6 billion of stock to several investors, including Thrive Capital, SoftBank, and T. Rowe Price. That deal pushed the AI giant’s valuation to $500 billion, surpassing Musk’s SpaceX at $400 billion and pushing TikTok parent ByteDance into third place at $220 billion. For context, OpenAI was valued at just $300 billion earlier this year. The windfall comes in the middle of OpenAI's deal frenzy, aiming at securing funding for its massive AI infrastructure project, Stargate. The initiative is a four-year, $500 billion plan to build data centers across the U.S. with partners like Oracle and SoftBank. The project was first announced at a splashy White House press conference alongside President Donald Trump in January. Last month, OpenAI announced that five new Stargate data centers, along with the project’s flagship site in Abilene, Texas, and other ongoing projects, would bring Stargate to nearly 7 gigawatts of planned capacity and more than $400 billion in investment over the next three years. “AI can only fulfill its promise if we build the compute to power it. That compute is the key to ensuring everyone can benefit from AI and to unlocking future breakthroughs,†OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a press release announcing the new sites. On his personal blog, Altman claimed that if the industry can’t reach 10 gigawatts of compute, it may have to decide which AI applications take priority. Additionally, OpenAI also recently signed deals with Nvidia, Samsung, and SK Hynix to help source chips for its data centers. Nvidia alone said it would be investing up to $100 billion in the company. The news of OpenAI’s big valuation bump dropped the same week Elon Musk became the first person to hit a $500 billion net worth â€" it’s since ticked down to $499 billion. Most of Musk’s fortune is tied up in Tesla, where he owns about 12% of the company's stock. Tesla is one of the most valuable public companies with a market cap of $1.4 trillion. Its board even recently offered Musk a $1 trillion pay package to keep him focused. But Musk’s relationship with OpenAI, the company he helped start back in 2015, has soured. He’s been in a very public feud with CEO Sam Altman, even filing a lawsuit last year in federal court in Northern California, accusing Altman and OpenAI of fraud. Musk says he was duped into funding what he thought would remain a nonprofit research lab. Instead, the lawsuit alleges, Altman quietly built a secretive network of for-profit OpenAI affiliates, took control of the non-profit’s board, engaged in self-dealing, and diverted the non-profit’s talent and tech for financial gain. And while OpenAI’s valuation keeps rocketing higher, Sam Altman himself is still only worth about $20 million, according to Forbes.

Sam Altman on AI bubble: 'People make some dumb capital allocations' from time to time | Fortune

OpenAI could now be the world's most valuable startup, ahead of Elon Musk's SpaceX and TikTok's parent company ByteDance, after a secondary stock sale designed to retain employees at the ChatGPT maker. Current and former OpenAI employees sold $6.6 billion in shares to a group of investors, pushing the privately held artificial intelligence company's valuation to $500 billion, according to a source with knowledge of the deal who was not authorized to discuss it publicly. The investors buying the shares included Thrive Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group and T. Rowe Price, along with Japanese tech giant SoftBank and the United Arab Emirates' MGX, the source said Thursday. The valuation reflects high expectations for the future of AI technology and continues OpenAI's remarkable trajectory from its start as a nonprofit research lab in 2015. But with the San Francisco-based company not yet turning a profit, it could also amplify concerns about an AI bubble if the generative AI products made by OpenAI and its competitors don't meet the expectations of investors pouring billions of dollars into research and development. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has sought to dismiss those concerns, most recently last week, when he toured a massive data center complex being built to run the company's AI systems in Abilene, Texas. "Between the ten years we've already been operating and the many decades ahead of us, there will be booms and busts," Altman said after being asked about a bubble. "People will overinvest and lose money, and underinvest and lose a lot of revenue." He added that "we'll make some dumb capital allocations" and there will be short-term ups and downs but that "over the arc that we have to plan over, we are confident that this technology will drive a new wave of unprecedented economic growth," along with scientific breakthroughs, improvements to quality of life and "new ways to express creativity." Just this week, the company launched two different business ventures, one a partnership with Etsy and Shopify for online shopping through ChatGPT and another a social media app, Sora, for generating and sharing AI videos. OpenAI has been struggling to offer investors and staff the same perks and compensation as the publicly traded tech giants with which it competes. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, in particular, has been on a hiring spree for elite AI engineers and in June made a $14.3 billion investment in AI company Scale that recruited its CEO Alexandr Wang. OpenAI's for-profit subsidiary, valued at $500 billion, is technically controlled by the board of OpenAI's nonprofit and both are still bound to pursue the nonprofit's charitable purpose. OpenAI's partnerships with major companies and its plans to change its corporate structure have drawn the scrutiny of regulators, including the attorneys general of California and Delaware, who oversee charitable organizations that operate or are incorporated in their states. The company has made big deals in recent weeks with Oracle and SoftBank, its partners on a data center venture called Stargate, and with chipmaker Nvidia, which makes the specialized AI chips those data centers need. At the same time, it has lessened its reliance on longtime backer Microsoft. In September, OpenAI announced it had reached a tentative agreement with Microsoft about the future stake of its nonprofit in its for-profit corporation but released few details. It also opened applications for nonprofits to apply for $50 million in funding from OpenAI, an effort it launched in response to the recommendations of an advisory board. The grants will go toward projects that increase public understanding of AI, support the design of AI for uses that communities want and increase economic opportunity. The deadline to apply closes on Oct. 8. AP Philanthropy Writer Thalia Beaty contributed to this report. -- -- -- - The Associated Press and OpenAI have a licensing and technology agreement that allows OpenAI access to part of AP's text archives.

OpenAI now worth $500 billion, possibly making it the world's most valuable startup

OpenAI could now be the world's most valuable startup, ahead of Elon Musk's SpaceX and TikTok's parent company ByteDance, after a secondary stock sale designed to retain employees at the ChatGPT maker. Current and former OpenAI employees sold $6.6 billion in shares to a group of investors, pushing the privately held artificial intelligence company's valuation to $500 billion, according to a source with knowledge of the deal who was not authorized to discuss it publicly. The investors buying the shares included Thrive Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group and T. Rowe Price, along with Japanese tech giant SoftBank and the United Arab Emirates' MGX, the source said Thursday. The valuation reflects high expectations for the future of AI technology and continues OpenAI's remarkable trajectory from its start as a nonprofit research lab in 2015. But with the San Francisco-based company not yet turning a profit, it could also amplify concerns about an AI bubble if the generative AI products made by OpenAI and its competitors don't meet the expectations of investors pouring billions of dollars into research and development. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has sought to dismiss those concerns, most recently last week, when he toured a massive data center complex being built to run the company's AI systems in Abilene, Texas. "Between the ten years we've already been operating and the many decades ahead of us, there will be booms and busts," Altman said after being asked about a bubble. "People will overinvest and lose money, and underinvest and lose a lot of revenue." He added that "we'll make some dumb capital allocations" and there will be short-term ups and downs but that "over the arc that we have to plan over, we are confident that this technology will drive a new wave of unprecedented economic growth," along with scientific breakthroughs, improvements to quality of life and "new ways to express creativity." Just this week, the company launched two different business ventures, one a partnership with Etsy and Shopify for online shopping through ChatGPT and another a social media app, Sora, for generating and sharing AI videos. OpenAI has been struggling to offer investors and staff the same perks and compensation as the publicly traded tech giants with which it competes. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, in particular, has been on a hiring spree for elite AI engineers and in June made a $14.3 billion investment in AI company Scale that recruited its CEO Alexandr Wang. OpenAI's for-profit subsidiary, valued at $500 billion, is technically controlled by the board of OpenAI's nonprofit and both are still bound to pursue the nonprofit's charitable purpose. OpenAI's partnerships with major companies and its plans to change its corporate structure have drawn the scrutiny of regulators, including the attorneys general of California and Delaware, who oversee charitable organizations that operate or are incorporated in their states. The company has made big deals in recent weeks with Oracle and SoftBank, its partners on a data center venture called Stargate, and with chipmaker Nvidia, which makes the specialized AI chips those data centers need. At the same time, it has lessened its reliance on longtime backer Microsoft. In September, OpenAI announced it had reached a tentative agreement with Microsoft about the future stake of its nonprofit in its for-profit corporation but released few details. It also opened applications for nonprofits to apply for $50 million in funding from OpenAI, an effort it launched in response to the recommendations of an advisory board. The grants will go toward projects that increase public understanding of AI, support the design of AI for uses that communities want and increase economic opportunity. The deadline to apply closes on Oct. 8.

OpenAI Tops SpaceX as World's Most Valuable Private Company With $500 Billion Valuation - Decrypt

Secondary deal aids staff retention amid Meta's nine-figure pay offers. OpenAI has overtaken SpaceX to become the world's most valuable private company after a $6.6 billion employee share sale at a $500 billion valuation -- the milestone underscoring the investor frenzy fueling the artificial-intelligence boom. According to a Bloomberg report, the secondary sale lets current and former staff who had held shares for at least two years sell stock to a handful of companies, including Thrive Capital, SoftBank Group, Dragoneer Investment Group, Abu Dhabi's MGX, and T. Rowe Price. The deal marks OpenAI's second major tender offer in under a year, following a $1.5 billion SoftBank transaction last November. In January, the Japanese conglomerate was reportedly in talks to earmark up to $25 billion for OpenAI. SoftBank's U.S.-traded shares (SFTBY) rose 1.7% to $66.04 on Thursday after news of the OpenAI share sale, reflecting investor enthusiasm for its AI-linked deals. The $500 billion figure reflects a steep rise for OpenAI from earlier in the year, when the ChatGPT developer was valued at $300 billion following a $40 billion funding round led by Softbank in March. With this latest move, the company now sits ahead of SpaceX -- whose own valuation is estimated near $400 billion -- putting OpenAI at the top of the private company universe. Despite scrutiny around the rollout of GPT-5, investor confidence remains undimmed. In September, OpenAI and Nvidia unveiled a strategic infrastructure partnership: OpenAI plans to deploy at least 10 gigawatts of Nvidia systems, and Nvidia will invest up to $100 billion progressively as each gigawatt is deployed. Jensen Huang described it as part of "bringing AI infrastructure from the labs into the world." It also coincides with the ongoing Stargate partnership between OpenAI, Softbank, and Oracle to build out America's AI infrastructure backed by the Trump Administration. The sale also gives employees liquidity that could help the company fend off nine-figure pay packages from rivals such as Meta, which is aggressively hiring for its new Superintelligence Labs. The timing also coincides with structural moves at OpenAI. The company lifted its capped-profit limit in May, all the while facing continued legal pressure from Elon Musk. An OpenAI co-founder, Musk has sued the company on multiple occasions. Musk has accused OpenAI of abandoning its original nonprofit mission and allegedly attempting to steal xAI data and trade secrets.

OpenAI valuation soars to $500 bn in private share sale: reports

Paris (AFP) - The valuation of ChatGPT developer OpenAI soared to a chart-topping $500 billion in a deal for employees to sell a limited number of shares, financial media reported Thursday. If confirmed, OpenAI workers' sale of a reported $6.6 billion in shares to investors would make the company the world's most valuable startup, overtaking Elon Musk's rocket company SpaceX -- valued at around $400 billion, according to Bloomberg. A gaggle of investors snapping up the shares included Japanese investment giant SoftBank, the Financial Times and Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the transaction. OpenAI's French spokespeople declined to comment on the reports when contacted by AFP, while its US press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Softbank declined to comment on the reports. Known for making high-stakes bets on tech, SoftBank had already committed to ploughing $40 billion into OpenAI by the end of 2025 if the startup met certain conditions. That March deal valued the US company at $300 billion, less than three years after its flagship chatbot ChatGPT wowed the public with its ability to generate convincing text responses. Other investors cited by the FT and Bloomberg Thursday included venture capital firms Thrive Capital and Dragoneer and Abu Dhabi's AI investment company MGX. In the first six months of 2025, OpenAI pulled in around $4.3 billion in revenue, specialist outlet The Information reported this week. But like other generative AI developers, OpenAI has spending plans running into the hundreds of billions over the coming years to build the computing infrastructure needed to develop and operate its services. Some industry observers raised concern last week at its receipt of an investment pledge worth up to $100 billion from chip giant Nvidia. Once known for PC gaming hardware, Nvidia has soared to become the world's most valuable company, worth around $4.5 trillion, on the back of the generative AI boom, with much of the software running on its graphics processing units (GPUs). Nvidia chief Jensen Huang has been ploughing some of the company's cash into firms buying its own products, including OpenAI and cloud computing providers such as Coreweave. But while some have flagged such deals as potential warning signs of a bubble in the generative AI sector, investors have continued piling in -- with OpenAI rival Anthropic raising $13 billion at a $183 billion valuation last month.

Reports: OpenAI hits $500bn valuation after share sale

The reported valuation makes it the world's most valuable private company. OpenAI has reached a $500bn valuation after current and former employees at the ChatGPT-maker sold approximately $6.6bn worth of shares, multiple news publications report. This is up from a $300bn valuation the company announced just this April - making OpenAI the world's most valuable private company, bigger than SpaceX and TikTok's parent ByteDance. According to sources, OpenAI had authorised more than $10bn in shares for secondary sale - up from its previous target of $6bn. The offer was made to former and present employees this September with participation open to those who held their shares for more than two years. However, only around two-thirds of the approved value exchanged ownership. Those giving away their shares sold it to a consortium of investors including SoftBank, Thrive Capital, Abu Dhabi's MGX, Dragoneer Investment Group and T.Rowe Price. A lower share sale means that, internally, employees are confident of OpenAI's long-term prospects. While the gargantuan valuation means that large, key investors see OpenAI as a central pillar to the ongoing AI overhaul of industries and workplaces, down to the content viewed on social media. Reports of a possible buy-back of shares were swirling since August. It comes after the money-leaking start-up signed a massive $300bn deal to use Oracle's compute power, reportedly paid $10bn to Broadcom for custom-made AI chips, while signing contracts in the UK to develop the country's AI infrastructure through its Stargate venture. The company is also ironing out its restructuring plans with Microsoft, which is expected to take a 30pc stake in the company. Making AI palatable OpenAI just released a vertically scrollable social app filled with AI-generated short form videos that users have created using Sora 2, its latest video generating model. The app, called Sora, is only available in the US and Canada - as of now - and early reviews already highlight that the AI slop there is rife with copyrighted materials. The app also gives users the ability to generate the likeness of any person and share the short-form videos with their followers and friends. Meaning, bad actors could generate clips of fake events - making the very real problem of disinformation, worse. Despite the possible negatives, the app achieves in making the consumption of AI-generated content more palatable to users. As The New York Times puts it, OpenAI has created a way to bring "AI to the masses that people can share, enticing one another to create posts and regularly use their apps and services." Other companies such as Meta, with its AI app called Vibes, is trying to achieve the same. This is where, perhaps, OpenAI has succeeded. Since the launch of ChatGPT all the way back in 2022, to Sora today, the company makes interacting with, and consuming AI easier and entertaining, successfully making the permeation of AI into our lives seem almost normal. Don't miss out on the knowledge you need to succeed. Sign up for the Daily Brief, Silicon Republic's digest of need-to-know sci-tech news.

OpenAI reportedly closes new $6.6B secondary sale at $500B valuation - SiliconANGLE

OpenAI reportedly closes new $6.6B secondary sale at $500B valuation OpenAI has recently concluded a secondary sale that valued it at $500 million, multiple publications reported today. CNBC cited sources as saying that the ChatGPT developer first approached current and former employees about the deal early last month. Originally, OpenAI planned to make $10.3 billion shares available to investors through the transaction. The participants only sold about $6.6 billion in stock, which OpenAI staffers reportedly interpret as a "sign of employee confidence." The transaction was open to current and former staffers who had held OpenAI shares for at least two years. The investor consortium that bought the stock reportedly included T. Rowe Price, Dragoneer Investment Group and Thrive Capital. The latter firm backed a $6.5 billion equity investment in OpenAI last September. The ChatGPT developer's newly closed secondary sale reportedly also included contributions from SoftBank Group Corp. and Abu Dhabi's MGX. Both companies are backing OpenAI's Stargate initiative, a $500 billion push to build a network of artificial intelligence data centers in the U.S. The facilities' combined compute capacity is expected to exceed 10 gigawatts. OpenAI is also building AI infrastructure internationally as part of a program called OpenAI for Countries. Since May, the AI provider has announced plans to open data centers in Norway, the United Arab Emirates and the UK. On Wednesday, OpenAI revealed that it will also explore data center projects in Korea. The potential infrastructure investment was announced alongside partnerships with Korea's Samsung Electronics Co. and SK hynix Inc., the world's two largest suppliers of memory chips. OpenAI plans to purchase up to 900,000 wafers per month, which reportedly represents about 40% of the world's supply. It's believed that OpenAI plans to spend $350 billion on server rentals through 2030. That could make it difficult for the AI provider to become profitable in the near to mid term. The fact that the recently closed secondary sale valued OpenAI at $500 billion, a $200 billion increase over its March valuation, suggests investors are confident in its ability to manage its increasing costs. The AI provider's rapidly improving top line likely also factored into the valuation bump. OpenAI reportedly generated $4.3 billion in sales during the first half of the year, which more than its entire 2024 revenue. Secondary sales don't provide the companies that organize them with new capital. However, the valuation increase the transaction delivered could still provide financial benefits for OpenAI. Notably, the deal may make it easier for OpenAI to ink more all-stock acquisitions. The greater the value of a company's shares, the fewer of them it must issue to finance acquisitions.

ChatGPT maker OpenAI becomes world's most valuable startup at $500B

ChatGPT maker OpenAI's value has soared to a sky-high $500 billion following a secondary sale of its shares held by current and former employees. Reuters reported Thursday that the group of employees unloaded around $6.6 billion in shares in the deal, pushing OpenAI's valuation well north of its current valuation of $300 billion. During the secondary sale's open window, OpenAI shareholders offloaded their stock to an investor group that included SoftBank, Thrive Capital, T. Rowe Price, Dragoneer Investment Group, and Emirati state-owned AI investment firm MGX, according to a source who described the deal's details to Reuters. While $6.6 billion in shares changed hands during the secondary market sale, OpenAI reportedly authorized the sale of more than $10 billion in stock. The discrepancy suggests that plenty of shareholders are confident holding onto their shares and opted not to sell. CNBC and Bloomberg reported rumors of an upcoming sale in August, noting that the talks were then in early stages but an OpenAI secondary sale could value the company at $500 billion.

OpenAI valuation reaches $500 billion, topping Musk's SpaceX | Fortune

Current and former OpenAI employees sold about $6.6 billion of stock to investors including Thrive Capital, SoftBank Group Corp., Dragoneer Investment Group, Abu Dhabi's MGX and T. Rowe Price, a person familiar with the transaction said. That boosted the US company's price tag well past its previous $300 billion level during a SoftBank-led financing round earlier this year. That rapid rise underscores the investment frenzy surrounding the leaders of a technology with the potential to transform industries and economies. Sam Altman's OpenAI is one of several companies including Nvidia Corp. now leading a global push to build data centers and develop artificial intelligence services, an undertaking that's expected to cost trillions of dollars. Though it has yet to turn a profit, the US startup is helping fuel that infrastructure boom by inking mega-sized deals with the likes of Oracle Corp. and SK Hynix Inc. Representatives for Thrive Capital and Dragoneer didn't immediately respond to requests for comment. OpenAI, SoftBank and T. Rowe Price spokespeople declined to comment. A spokesperson for MGX said the firm is "pleased to be a core partner to OpenAI and to continue building on our strong relationship as a significant investor across multiple funding rounds." The deal vaults OpenAI past SpaceX's $400 billion valuation. That milestone coincides with a pivotal time for Altman's company, which is in negotiations with Microsoft Corp. to convert into a more traditional for-profit company. OpenAI was founded in 2015 as a nonprofit dedicated to advancing digital intelligence "in the way that is most likely to benefit humanity as a whole." Planned changes will give the existing OpenAI nonprofit entity control over a new public benefit corporation. Both Altman and Musk, who were OpenAI co-founders, have spoken about the potential existential risk to humans posed by AI. Yet they've since fallen out: Musk has sued to try and stop the overhaul, accusing OpenAI of forsaking promises to him when he helped to create the nonprofit. He claims it abandoned its founding purpose when it accepted billions of dollars in backing from Microsoft starting in 2019, the year after he left OpenAI's board. When it comes to the business itself, OpenAI faces an increasingly competitive market for AI talent as big tech firms jockey for the resources they need. Meta Platforms Inc., for one, has recruited researchers aggressively from OpenAI and other top labs for its new "superintelligence" team, offering pay packages in the nine-figure range. A secondary sale could help OpenAI incentivize staff to stay at the company and turn down those lavish compensation offers. Major US startups often negotiate share sales for their employees as a way to reward and retain staff, and also attract external investors. OpenAI is looking to leverage investor demand to provide employees with liquidity that reflects the company's growth. The value of a company tied to a secondary share sale is separate from the traditional private market valuation set when a startup completes a new round of funding. The total amount of eligible units sold in the secondary fell short of the $10 billion-plus worth of stock that the company allowed for sale, the person familiar said, speaking on condition of anonymity as the information is private. That could mean current and former employees are demonstrating confidence in the long-term viability of the business, the person added. In the long run, OpenAI faces mounting competitive pressure from rivals such as Google and Anthropic, which is also raising capital at a rapid clip. In response, OpenAI has embarked on a spate of recent technology product launches. Those include a pair of open and freely available artificial intelligence models that can mimic the human process of reasoning, months after China's DeepSeek gained global attention with its own open software. OpenAI released its most powerful GPT-5 model in August, aimed at shoring up its lead in an increasingly crowded sphere.

OpenAI valuation soars to $500 bn in private share sale: reports

The valuation of ChatGPT developer OpenAI soared to a chart-topping $500 billion in a deal for employees to sell a limited number of shares, financial media reported Thursday. If confirmed, OpenAI workers' sale of a reported $6.6 billion in shares to investors would make the company the world's most valuable startup, overtaking Elon Musk's rocket company SpaceX -- valued at around $400 billion, according to Bloomberg. A gaggle of investors snapping up the shares included Japanese investment giant SoftBank, the Financial Times and Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the transaction. OpenAI's French spokespeople declined to comment on the reports when contacted by AFP, while its US press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. SoftBank declined to comment on the reports. Known for making high-stakes bets on tech, SoftBank had already committed to plowing $40 billion into OpenAI by the end of 2025 if the startup met certain conditions. That March deal valued the US company at $300 billion, less than three years after its flagship chatbot ChatGPT wowed the public with its ability to generate convincing text responses. Other investors cited by the FT and Bloomberg Thursday included venture capital firms Thrive Capital and Dragoneer and Abu Dhabi's AI investment company MGX. In the first six months of 2025, OpenAI pulled in around $4.3 billion in revenue, specialist outlet The Information reported this week. But like other generative AI developers, OpenAI has spending plans running into the hundreds of billions over the coming years to build the computing infrastructure needed to develop and operate its services. Some industry observers raised concern last week at its receipt of an investment pledge worth up to $100 billion from chip giant Nvidia. Once known for PC gaming hardware, Nvidia has soared to become the world's most valuable company, worth around $4.5 trillion, on the back of the generative AI boom, with much of the software running on its graphics processing units (GPUs). Nvidia chief Jensen Huang has been plowing some of the company's cash into firms buying its own products, including OpenAI and cloud computing providers such as Coreweave. But while some have flagged such deals as potential warning signs of a bubble in the generative AI sector, investors have continued piling in -- with OpenAI rival Anthropic raising $13 billion at a $183 billion valuation last month.

OpenAI now worth $500 billion, possibly making it the world's most valuable startup

OpenAI could now be the world's most valuable startup, ahead of Elon Musk's SpaceX and TikTok parent company ByteDance, after a secondary stock sale designed to retain employees at the ChatGPT maker OpenAI could now be the world's most valuable startup, ahead of Elon Musk's SpaceX and TikTok's parent company ByteDance, after a secondary stock sale designed to retain employees at the ChatGPT maker. Current and former OpenAI employees sold $6.6 billion in shares to a group of investors, pushing the privately held artificial intelligence company's valuation to $500 billion, according to a source with knowledge of the deal who was not authorized to discuss it publicly. The investors buying the shares included Thrive Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group and T. Rowe Price, along with Japanese tech giant SoftBank and the United Arab Emirates' MGX, the source said Thursday. The valuation reflects high expectations for the future of AI technology and continues OpenAI's remarkable trajectory from its start as a nonprofit research lab in 2015. But with the San Francisco-based company not yet turning a profit, it could also amplify concerns about an AI bubble if the generative AI products made by OpenAI and its competitors don't meet the expectations of investors pouring billions of dollars into research and development. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has sought to dismiss those concerns, most recently last week, when he toured a massive data center complex being built to run the company's AI systems in Abilene, Texas. "Between the ten years we've already been operating and the many decades ahead of us, there will be booms and busts," Altman said after being asked about a bubble. "People will overinvest and lose money, and underinvest and lose a lot of revenue." He added that "we'll make some dumb capital allocations" and there will be short-term ups and downs but that "over the arc that we have to plan over, we are confident that this technology will drive a new wave of unprecedented economic growth," along with scientific breakthroughs, improvements to quality of life and "new ways to express creativity." Just this week, the company launched two different business ventures, one a partnership with Etsy and Shopify for online shopping through ChatGPT and another a social media app, Sora, for generating and sharing AI videos. OpenAI has been struggling to offer investors and staff the same perks and compensation as the publicly traded tech giants with which it competes. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, in particular, has been on a hiring spree for elite AI engineers and in June made a $14.3 billion investment in AI company Scale that recruited its CEO Alexandr Wang. OpenAI's for-profit subsidiary, valued at $500 billion, is technically controlled by the board of OpenAI's nonprofit and both are still bound to pursue the nonprofit's charitable purpose. OpenAI's partnerships with major companies and its plans to change its corporate structure have drawn the scrutiny of regulators, including the attorneys general of California and Delaware, who oversee charitable organizations that operate or are incorporated in their states. The company has made big deals in recent weeks with Oracle and SoftBank, its partners on a data center venture called Stargate, and with chipmaker Nvidia, which makes the specialized AI chips those data centers need. At the same time, it has lessened its reliance on longtime backer Microsoft. In September, OpenAI announced it had reached a tentative agreement with Microsoft about the future stake of its nonprofit in its for-profit corporation but released few details. It also opened applications for nonprofits to apply for $50 million in funding from OpenAI, an effort it launched in response to the recommendations of an advisory board. The grants will go toward projects that increase public understanding of AI, support the design of AI for uses that communities want and increase economic opportunity. The deadline to apply closes on Oct. 8. -- -- AP Philanthropy Writer Thalia Beaty contributed to this report. -- -- -- - The Associated Press and OpenAI have a licensing and technology agreement that allows OpenAI access to part of AP's text archives.

OpenAI now worth $500 billion, possibly making it the world's most valuable startup

OpenAI could now be the world's most valuable startup, ahead of Elon Musk's SpaceX and TikTok's parent company ByteDance, after a secondary stock sale designed to retain employees at the ChatGPT maker. Current and former OpenAI employees sold $6.6 billion in shares to a group of investors, pushing the privately held artificial intelligence company's valuation to $500 billion, according to a source with knowledge of the deal who was not authorized to discuss it publicly. The investors buying the shares included Thrive Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group and T. Rowe Price, along with Japanese tech giant SoftBank and the United Arab Emirates' MGX, the source said Thursday. The valuation reflects high expectations for the future of AI technology and continues OpenAI's remarkable trajectory from its start as a nonprofit research lab in 2015. But with the San Francisco-based company not yet turning a profit, it could also amplify concerns about an AI bubble if the generative AI products made by OpenAI and its competitors don't meet the expectations of investors pouring billions of dollars into research and development. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has sought to dismiss those concerns, most recently last week, when he toured a massive data center complex being built to run the company's AI systems in Abilene, Texas. "Between the ten years we've already been operating and the many decades ahead of us, there will be booms and busts," Altman said after being asked about a bubble. "People will overinvest and lose money, and underinvest and lose a lot of revenue." He added that "we'll make some dumb capital allocations" and short-term ups and downs but that "over the arc that we have to plan over, we are confident that this technology will drive a new wave of unprecedented economic growth," along with scientific breakthroughs, improvements to quality of life and "new ways to express creativity." Just this week, the company launched two different business ventures, one a partnership with Etsy and Shopify for online shopping through ChatGPT and another a social media app, Sora, for generating and sharing AI videos. The stock sale is a first for OpenAI, which has been struggling to offer investors and staff the same perks and compensation as other companies. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, in particular, has been on a hiring spree for elite AI engineers and in June made a $14.3 billion investment in AI company Scale that recruited its CEO Alexandr Wang. OpenAI's for-profit subsidiary, valued at $500 billion, is technically controlled by the board of OpenAI's nonprofit and both are still bound to pursue the nonprofit's charitable purpose. OpenAI's partnerships with major companies and its plans to change its corporate structure have drawn the scrutiny of regulators, including the attorneys general of California and Delaware, who oversee charitable organizations that operate or are incorporated in their states. The company has made big deals in recent weeks with Oracle and SoftBank, its partners on a data center venture called Stargate, and with chipmaker Nvidia, which makes the specialized AI chips those data centers need. At the same time, it has lessened its reliance on longtime backer Microsoft. In September, OpenAI announced it had reached a tentative agreement with Microsoft about the future stake of its nonprofit in its for-profit corporation but released few details. It also opened applications for nonprofits to apply for $50 million in funding from OpenAI, an effort it launched in response to the recommendations of an advisory board. The grants will go toward projects that increase public understanding of AI, support the design of AI for uses that communities want and increase economic opportunity. The deadline to apply closes on Oct. 8. -- -- AP Philanthropy Writer Thalia Beaty contributed to this report.

OpenAI Now Worth $500 Billion, Possibly Making It the World's Most Valuable Startup

OpenAI could now be the world's most valuable startup, ahead of Elon Musk's SpaceX and TikTok's parent company ByteDance, after a secondary stock sale designed to retain employees at the ChatGPT maker. Current and former OpenAI employees sold $6.6 billion in shares to a group of investors, pushing the privately held artificial intelligence company's valuation to $500 billion, according to a source with knowledge of the deal who was not authorized to discuss it publicly. The investors buying the shares included Thrive Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group and T. Rowe Price, along with Japanese tech giant SoftBank and the United Arab Emirates' MGX, the source said Thursday. The valuation reflects high expectations for the future of AI technology and continues OpenAI's remarkable trajectory from its start as a nonprofit research lab in 2015. But with the San Francisco-based company not yet turning a profit, it could also amplify concerns about an AI bubble if the generative AI products made by OpenAI and its competitors don't meet the expectations of investors pouring billions of dollars into research and development. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has sought to dismiss those concerns, most recently last week, when he toured a massive data center complex being built to run the company's AI systems in Abilene, Texas. "Between the ten years we've already been operating and the many decades ahead of us, there will be booms and busts," Altman said after being asked about a bubble. "People will overinvest and lose money, and underinvest and lose a lot of revenue." He added that "we'll make some dumb capital allocations" and short-term ups and downs but that "over the arc that we have to plan over, we are confident that this technology will drive a new wave of unprecedented economic growth," along with scientific breakthroughs, improvements to quality of life and "new ways to express creativity." Just this week, the company launched two different business ventures, one a partnership with Etsy and Shopify for online shopping through ChatGPT and another a social media app, Sora, for generating and sharing AI videos. The stock sale is a first for OpenAI, which has been struggling to offer investors and staff the same perks and compensation as other companies. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, in particular, has been on a hiring spree for elite AI engineers and in June made a $14.3 billion investment in AI company Scale that recruited its CEO Alexandr Wang. OpenAI's for-profit subsidiary, valued at $500 billion, is technically controlled by the board of OpenAI's nonprofit and both are still bound to pursue the nonprofit's charitable purpose. OpenAI's partnerships with major companies and its plans to change its corporate structure have drawn the scrutiny of regulators, including the attorneys general of California and Delaware, who oversee charitable organizations that operate or are incorporated in their states. The company has made big deals in recent weeks with Oracle and SoftBank, its partners on a data center venture called Stargate, and with chipmaker Nvidia, which makes the specialized AI chips those data centers need. At the same time, it has lessened its reliance on longtime backer Microsoft. In September, OpenAI announced it had reached a tentative agreement with Microsoft about the future stake of its nonprofit in its for-profit corporation but released few details. It also opened applications for nonprofits to apply for $50 million in funding from OpenAI, an effort it launched in response to the recommendations of an advisory board. The grants will go toward projects that increase public understanding of AI, support the design of AI for uses that communities want and increase economic opportunity. The deadline to apply closes on Oct. 8. -- -- AP Philanthropy Writer Thalia Beaty contributed to this report.

OpenAI Made More Money in the First Six Months of the Year Than It Did in All of 2024

OpenAI made more money in the first half of this year than it did in all of 2024. According to shareholder documents viewed by The Information, OpenAI generated $4.3 billion in revenue for the first six months of 2025, or about 16% more than its revenue for all of 2024. The strong revenue growth is mostly due to OpenAI's rapid expansion and the increased adoption of its flagship product, ChatGPT. As of August, the chatbot had 700 million weekly users, four times the number it had at the same time last year. Related: OpenAI Is Creating a LinkedIn Competitor to Help You Find a Job As it builds new AI infrastructure, OpenAI is simultaneously expanding what ChatGPT can do. For example, the startup announced on Monday that it would allow users to buy items from Etsy and Shopify merchants directly through ChatGPT. OpenAI also debuted new parental controls on Monday to help parents moderate what their children see through the chatbot. According to The Information, research and development (R&D) is a main expense for the company. OpenAI spent $2.5 billion on R&D in 2024, with costs soaring to $6.7 billion for the division during the first half of 2025. At the end of the first six months of the year, the AI giant had about $17.5 billion in cash and securities. The company has set a goal of generating $13 billion in annual revenue this year, and expects its total cash burn for the year to reach $8.5 billion, according to the report. Related: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Thinks We're in an AI Bubble Because Investors Are 'Overexcited' About Artificial Intelligence In recent months, OpenAI has also signed agreements to build AI infrastructure. Last week, OpenAI announced that it plans to build a network of five AI data centers over the next three years. The project will require a $400 billion investment. In a separate agreement last week, AI chipmaker Nvidia said it plans to invest up to $100 billion in OpenAI to build additional new data centers. OpenAI's valuation is higher than ever, with the startup last valued at $300 billion in March. An August Reuters report showed that OpenAI was in early-stage talks to administer a stock sale that would value the company at $500 billion.

Sam Altman's OpenAI Is Officially the World's Most Valuable Startup at $500B

OpenAI's rapid ascent comes amid lawsuits, restructuring plans and growing social scrutiny. OpenAI has reached a new milestone: a $500 billion valuation that makes it the world's most valuable private company, surpassing Elon Musk's SpaceX and widening the gap with other major private companies like its direct competitor, Anthropic, and TikTok parent ByteDance. Sign Up For Our Daily Newsletter Sign Up Thank you for signing up! By clicking submit, you agree to our <a href="http://observermedia.com/terms">terms of service</a> and acknowledge we may use your information to send you emails, product samples, and promotions on this website and other properties. You can opt out anytime. See all of our newsletters The staggering valuation follows a secondary shares sale, first reported by Bloomberg, that allowed current and former employees to sell stock to investors, including Thrive Capital, SoftBank, Dragoneer Investment Group, MGX and T. Rowe Price, The sale didn't bring new funding to the company but boosted its valuation from $300 billion in March, when it raised $40 billion in a round led by SoftBank. OpenAI was founded in 2015 as a nonprofit dedicated to advancing A.I. for humanity's benefit, but later adopted a capped-profit structure. The company currently has about 700 million weekly users and $12 billion in annualized revenue. It has signed some of the largest cloud deals, including a $300 billion partnership with Oracle for computing power over the next five years. The company is also in the midst of a long-anticipated transition to a for-profit structure. Last month, it signed a non-binding deal with Microsoft, its largest shareholder, to convert its for-profit arm into a public benefit corporation controlled by the remaining nonprofit. Elon Musk, who left OpenAI in 2018 and went on to launch his own startup, xAI, has since become one of the company's fiercest critics. He has filed multiple lawsuits aimed at halting its restructuring and accused the company of straying from its founding mission in favor of profits. Most recently, he sued the company for allegedly hiring former xAI employees who he claims stole trade secrets. Secondary share sales gain steam Secondary share sales, an increasingly popular method among startups to retain and reward staff, have boosted the valuation of several already highly valued companies. SpaceX reached a $400 billion valuation in July after a round of secondary share sales; Stripe's February tender offer valued it at $91.5 billion; and Databricks' December secondary sale gave the company a $62 billion valuation. As OpenAI's tools continue weaving into daily life, the company has had to reckon with the social consequences of its rapid ascent. Earlier this month, it rolled out parental controls for ChatGPT, giving parents options such as limiting their children's exposure to sensitive content or disabling certain voice and image modes. The feature came after OpenAI was sued in August by the parents of a teenager who committed suicide after ChatGPT allegedly gave him self-harm advice. More recently, OpenAI sparked backlash with the launch of Sora, a short-form A.I. video app, drawing criticism that consumer-facing products conflict with its loftier goals of scientific advances and artificial general intelligence (AGI). Altman addressed the criticism on X yesterday (Oct. 1), writing: "It is also nice to show people cool new tech/products along the way, make them smile, and hopefully make some money given all that compute need." He added that most of OpenAI's resources remain focused on science and AGI research. "When we launched ChatGPT, there was a lot of 'who needs this and where is AGI?' Reality is nuanced when it comes to optimal trajectories for a company," he wrote.

OpenAI valuation soars to $500 billion, topping Musk's SpaceX

OpenAI has completed a deal to help employees sell shares in the company at a $500 billion valuation, propelling the ChatGPT owner past Elon Musk's SpaceX to become the world's largest startup. Current and former OpenAI employees sold about $6.6 billion of stock to investors including Thrive Capital, SoftBank Group Corp., Dragoneer Investment Group, Abu Dhabi's MGX and T. Rowe Price, a person familiar with the transaction said. That boosted the US company's price tag well past its previous $300 billion level during a SoftBank-led financing round earlier this year. That rapid rise underscores the investment frenzy surrounding the leaders of a technology with the potential to transform industries and economies. Sam Altman's OpenAI is one of several companies including Nvidia Corp. now leading a global push to build data centers and develop artificial intelligence services, an undertaking that's expected to cost trillions of dollars. Though it has yet to turn a profit, the US startup is helping fuel that infrastructure boom by inking mega-sized deals with the likes of Oracle Corp. and SK Hynix Inc. Representatives for Thrive Capital, Dragoneer, MGX and T. Rowe Price didn't immediately respond to requests for comment. OpenAI and SoftBank spokespeople declined to comment. The deal vaults OpenAI past SpaceX's $400 billion valuation. That milestone coincides with a pivotal time for Altman's company, which is in negotiations with Microsoft Corp. to convert into a more traditional for-profit company. OpenAI was founded in 2015 as a nonprofit dedicated to advancing digital intelligence "in the way that is most likely to benefit humanity as a whole." Planned changes will give the existing OpenAI nonprofit entity control over a new public benefit corporation. Both Altman and Musk, who were OpenAI co-founders, have spoken about the potential existential risk to humans posed by AI. Yet they've since fallen out: Musk has sued to try and stop the overhaul, accusing OpenAI of forsaking promises to him when he helped to create the nonprofit. He claims it abandoned its founding purpose when it accepted billions of dollars in backing from Microsoft starting in 2019, the year after he left OpenAI's board. When it comes to the business itself, OpenAI faces an increasingly competitive market for AI talent as Big Tech firms jockey for the resources they need. Meta Platforms Inc., for one, has recruited researchers aggressively from OpenAI and other top labs for its new "superintelligence" team, offering pay packages in the nine-figure range. A secondary sale could help OpenAI incentivize staff to stay at the company and turn down those lavish compensation offers. Major US startups often negotiate share sales for their employees as a way to reward and retain staff, and also attract external investors. OpenAI is looking to leverage investor demand to provide employees with liquidity that reflects the company's growth. The total amount of eligible units sold in the secondary fell short of the $10 billion-plus worth of stock that the company allowed for sale, the person familiar said, speaking on condition of anonymity as the information is private. That could mean current and former employees are demonstrating confidence in the long-term viability of the business, the person added. In the long run, OpenAI faces mounting competitive pressure from rivals such as Google and Anthropic, which is also raising capital at a rapid clip. In response, OpenAI has embarked on a spate of recent technology product launches. Those include a pair of open and freely available artificial intelligence models that can mimic the human process of reasoning, months after China's DeepSeek gained global attention with its own open software. OpenAI released its most powerful GPT-5 model in August, aimed at shoring up its lead in an increasingly crowded sphere. -- With assistance from Min Jeong Lee, Shadab Nazmi, Yasufumi Saito and Adveith Nair.

OpenAI's first-half revenue rises 16% to about $4.3 billion, The Information reports - The Economic Times

OpenAI said it burned $2.5 billion, in a large part due to its research and development costs for developing artificial intelligence and for running ChatGPT, the report added.OpenAI generated around $4.3 billion in revenue in the first half of 2025, about 16% more than it generated all of last year, The Information reported on Monday, citing financial disclosures to shareholders. OpenAI said it burned $2.5 billion, in a large part due to its research and development costs for developing artificial intelligence and for running ChatGPT, the report added. Reuters could not immediately verify the report.

OpenAI Closes Share Sale At $500 Billion Valuation, Overtakes Elon Musk's SpaceX: Reports - Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA)

OpenAI has reportedly reached a valuation of $500 billion, overtaking Elon Musk's rocket company SpaceX to become the world's largest startup. Current and former employees of the company behind ChatGPT sold about $6.6 billion worth of shares to investors, including Softbank Group, Thrive Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group, Abu Dhabi's MGX, and T. Rowe Price, according to media reports on Thursday. The company had authorized sales of $10-billion-plus worth of stock on the secondary market, Reuters reported. The deal represents a step-up from its current valuation of $300 billion, hit during a Softbank-led financing round earlier this year, and zooms past Elon Musk's rocket company, SpaceX's valuation of $400 billion, underscoring OpenAI's explosive growth. Pivotal Time As AI Investments Rise OpenAI generated around $4.3 billion in revenue in the first half of 2025, about 16% more than it generated all of last year, The Information reported earlier this week. The company is also on track to meet its full-year revenue target of $13 billion and a cash-burn target of $8.5 billion, the report added. The $500 billion valuation milestone comes at a pivotal time for the Sam Altman-led company, which is in negotiations with Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) to convert into a more traditional for-profit company. OpenAI was founded in 2015 as a nonprofit dedicated to advancing digital intelligence. Tech giants are pouring billions into AI infrastructure, betting on its potential to transform industries and economies. OpenAI has been inking deals with the likes of Oracle Corp (NYSE:ORCL), with chip designer Nvidia Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) pledging investments of up to $100 billion in the company. Read next: Elon Musk Becomes First Person Worth $500 Billion, Tesla CEO's Wealth Is Now Larger Than Palantir, Alibaba Image via Shutterstock MSFTMicrosoft Corp$517.00-0.52%OverviewNVDANVIDIA Corp$189.701.31%ORCLOracle Corp$292.081.06%Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs

OpenAI Half-Year Revenue Jumps 16% to $4.3 Billion | PYMNTS.com

By completing this form, you agree to receive marketing communications from PYMNTS and to the sharing of your information with our sponsor, if applicable, in accordance with our Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions. That's a 16% increase over last year, The Information reported late Monday (Sept. 29), citing disclosures from the artificial intelligence (AI) startup to its shareholders. The report notes that OpenAI's cash burn rate for the half year came to $2.5 billion, chiefly related to research and development expenses, such as the costs tied to building advanced AI models and running ChatGPT. PYMNTS has contacted OpenAI for comment but has not yet gotten a reply. The company spent $6.7 billion on research and development during the period, the report said, and had close to $17.5 billion in cash and securities after the first six months of the year. OpenAI is targeting a full-year revenue goal of $13 billion, with a cash-burn rate of $8.5 billion, The Information report said. Citing an unnamed source, the news outlet had reported in July that OpenAI had logged revenues of $12 billion for the first seven months of 2025, a figure which implies the company is generating $1 billion per month in revenue. Last week saw the news that OpenAI was searching for someone to oversee its monetization efforts, a job that would include leading a team responsible for bringing ads to ChatGPT. The company this week launched another revenue generation effort with the addition of a new eCommerce component to ChatGPT called "Instant Checkout." This service lets ChatGPT users in the U.S. make purchases from U.S.-based Etsy merchants, plus some sellers on Shopify. "This marks the next step in agentic commerce, where ChatGPT doesn't just help you find what to buy, it also helps you buy it," the company said in a news release. "For shoppers, it's seamless: go from chat to checkout in just a few taps. For sellers, it's a new way to reach hundreds of millions of people while keeping full control of their payments, systems and customer relationships." PYMNTS tested the new feature Monday soon after the launch, with that report noting that Instant Checkout represents a huge step in the convergence of discovery and payments. "Rather than presenting a sea of links, ChatGPT surfaces a curated few," the report said. "Visibility now shifts from search engine optimization and marketplace ads to AI optimization, structuring product and metadata to align with agent ranking logic."

OpenAI now worth US$500 billion, possibly making it the world's most valuable startup

OpenAI could now be the world's most valuable startup, ahead of Elon Musk's SpaceX and TikTok's parent company ByteDance, after a secondary stock sale designed to retain employees at the ChatGPT maker. Current and former OpenAI employees sold US$6.6 billion in shares to a group of investors, pushing the privately held artificial intelligence company's valuation to US$500 billion, according to a source with knowledge of the deal who was not authorized to discuss it publicly. The investors buying the shares included Thrive Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group and T. Rowe Price, along with Japanese tech giant SoftBank and the United Arab Emirates' MGX, the source said Thursday. The valuation reflects high expectations for the future of AI technology and continues OpenAI's remarkable trajectory from its start as a nonprofit research lab in 2015. But with the San Francisco-based company not yet turning a profit, it could also amplify concerns about an AI bubble if the generative AI products made by OpenAI and its competitors don't meet the expectations of investors pouring billions of dollars into research and development. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has sought to dismiss those concerns, most recently last week, when he toured a massive data center complex being built to run the company's AI systems in Abilene, Texas. "Between the ten years we've already been operating and the many decades ahead of us, there will be booms and busts," Altman said after being asked about a bubble. "People will overinvest and lose money, and underinvest and lose a lot of revenue." He added that "we'll make some dumb capital allocations" and short-term ups and downs but that "over the arc that we have to plan over, we are confident that this technology will drive a new wave of unprecedented economic growth," along with scientific breakthroughs, improvements to quality of life and "new ways to express creativity." Just this week, the company launched two different business ventures, one a partnership with Etsy and Shopify for online shopping through ChatGPT and another a social media app, Sora, for generating and sharing AI videos. The stock sale is a first for OpenAI, which has been struggling to offer investors and staff the same perks and compensation as other companies. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, in particular, has been on a hiring spree for elite AI engineers and in June made a US$14.3 billion investment in AI company Scale that recruited its CEO Alexandr Wang. OpenAI's for-profit subsidiary, valued at US$500 billion, is technically controlled by the board of OpenAI's nonprofit and both are still bound to pursue the nonprofit's charitable purpose. OpenAI's partnerships with major companies and its plans to change its corporate structure have drawn the scrutiny of regulators, including the attorneys general of California and Delaware, who oversee charitable organizations that operate or are incorporated in their states. The company has made big deals in recent weeks with Oracle and SoftBank, its partners on a data center venture called Stargate, and with chipmaker Nvidia, which makes the specialized AI chips those data centers need. At the same time, it has lessened its reliance on longtime backer Microsoft. In September, OpenAI announced it had reached a tentative agreement with Microsoft about the future stake of its nonprofit in its for-profit corporation but released few details. It also opened applications for nonprofits to apply for US$50 million in funding from OpenAI, an effort it launched in response to the recommendations of an advisory board. The grants will go toward projects that increase public understanding of AI, support the design of AI for uses that communities want and increase economic opportunity. The deadline to apply closes on Oct. 8. -- --

Sam Altman's OpenAI Surpasses Musk's SpaceX With $500 Billion Valuation

It has struck major deals with companies such as Oracle and SK Hynix in support of the broader push to construct data centers and AI services, a market that could be worth trillions of dollars. The timing of the deal is interesting. OpenAI is in talks with Microsoft to transition to a more conventional for-profit form. However, it still maintains its status as a public benefit corporation, held in trust by the founding nonprofit. Founded in 2015, OpenAI began as a nonprofit organization dedicated to developing AI for the benefit of everyone. However, detractors, including Musk, contended that accepting billions of dollars in support from was against the nonprofit's founding ideals.

OpenAI revenue hits $4.3 billion in first half of 2025- report By Investing.com

Investing.com -- OpenAI generated approximately $4.3 billion in revenue during the first six months of 2025, according to a report published Monday by The Information. This figure represents about 16% more than the company's total revenue for all of 2024, the report stated, citing financial disclosures made to OpenAI shareholders. The artificial intelligence company also reported spending $2.5 billion during this period. The significant expenditure was largely attributed to research and development costs associated with developing AI technologies and operating its ChatGPT service. This article was generated with the support of AI and reviewed by an editor. For more information see our T&C.