The company led by Sam Altman has secured exactly what it needed: billions of dollars, pushing its valuation to extraordinary numbers.
One of OpenAI’s main goals for this year was to raise the necessary funds to continue advancing. In its race to lead the artificial intelligence (AI) industry, the company has been burning through money at an extraordinary rate. After weeks of negotiations, Sam Altman has secured exactly what was needed: $6.5 billion in venture capital from a variety of investors.
According to Bloomberg, this represents one of the largest private investments in history. The scale of this funding round allows the AI firm to reach a valuation of over $150 billion. Very few companies have attracted this level of investor attention, among them SpaceX, Elon Musk’s space sector giant.
One of the Largest Private Investments in History
There are few details available regarding this capital raise. For now, sources close to the process say it was organized by Thrive Capital. Last month, rumors emerged that multinationals like Apple and Nvidia were interested in participating, though it was later reported that the iPhone maker ultimately decided not to invest, opting to maintain a “neutral” stance.
In any case, the fresh influx of cash flowing into OpenAI’s coffers will be key for it to stay in the race. Training AI models, as we know, is extremely expensive. Microsoft has invested more than $10 billion in the company, but even that hasn’t been enough. Moreover, OpenAI’s revenue from products like its model API and paid ChatGPT plans remains relatively low.
OpenAI, which has remained largely silent about its plans, confirmed the influx of more venture capital. In a blog post, the company stated, “the new funding will allow us to double down on our leadership in cutting-edge AI research, increase computing capacity, and continue building tools that help people solve difficult problems.”
This news comes after several noteworthy events. On one hand, the company has lost several of its founding members after last November’s crisis, during which its CEO was fired by the board, only to be reinstated later. On the other hand, Altman seems to be moving away from his altruistic roots with the goal of attracting more investors.
Over the past two years, we’ve watched as OpenAI has become a major player in the AI world. The company launched ChatGPT in November 2022, a product that was a true revolution. Later innovations followed, including large language models like GPT-4, GPT-4 Turbo, an advanced voice mode reminiscent of the movie Her, and the “reasoning” model 01.
