OpenAI employees may sell shares worth $6B to SoftBank, others
What's the story
Current and former employees of OpenAI are considering a sale of nearly $6 billion worth of the company's shares, according to Reuters. If successful, this deal would value OpenAI at a whopping $500 billion, significantly up from its current valuation of $300 billion. The move highlights both the rapid growth in users and revenue for OpenAI as well as the fierce competition among artificial intelligence (AI) companies for talent.
Investor participation
Talks still in early stages
The potential secondary share sale involves three investment firms, SoftBank Group, Thrive Capital, and Dragoneer Investment Group, all of which are existing investors in OpenAI. According to Bloomberg News, the talks are still in their early stages, and the final size of the sale could vary. This possible deal comes after SoftBank's involvement in leading OpenAI's $40 billion primary funding round earlier this year.
Financial performance
OpenAI's revenue and user growth
OpenAI has seen its revenue double in the first seven months of this year, hitting an annualized run rate of $12 billion. The company is on track to hit $20 billion by year's end, Reuters reported earlier. Backed by Microsoft, OpenAI's ChatGPT products boast some 700 million weekly active users, up from about 400 million back in February.