OpenAI raises $122 billion funds ahead of IPO buzz

OpenAI announced a record-breaking funding round as it secured $122 billion in committed capital with a valuation of  $852 billion. The round was co-led by SoftBank with backing from Andreessen Horowitz and D. E. Shaw Ventures, MGX, TPG, and T. Rowe Price Associates. Other participants in the round included Amazon, Nvidia, and Microsoft. 

"The capital being deployed today is helping build the infrastructure layer for intelligence itself," OpenAI said in a blog post. This is said to be its largest funding round to date as the company is planning for an initial public offering (IPO).

The round also included individual investors who participated through banks, which helped raise over $3 billion. In addition, OpenAI will now be included in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) managed by ARK Invest, which means more people can indirectly invest in OpenAI and benefit from its growth in the AI space.

The company also announced to expand its evolving credit facility to about $4.7 billion, which will be backed by major global banks, including JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, HSBC, and others.

With the funding, OpenAI also revealed that it is generating about $2 billion in revenue per month. “At this stage, we are growing revenue four times faster than the companies that defined the Internet and mobile eras, including Alphabet and Meta,” OpenAI stated. The company also highlighted that it has more than 900 million weekly active users with over 50 million subscribers. 

The company is also testing ads, which are already bringing more than $100 million in annual recurring revenue in under six weeks.

The company also confirmed to build a “unified AI superapp” that will bring together the capabilities of ChatGPT, Codex, browsing, and agentic capabilities. 

OpenAI said, “This is not just product simplification. It is a distribution and deployment strategy. By unifying our surfaces, we can translate advances in model capability directly into user adoption and engagement.”