OpenAI Raises $120 Billion in Record Fundraise, IPO on the Horizon
OpenAI’s record-breaking fundraise just got even bigger. CFO Sarah Friar announced that the company has secured an additional $10 billion from investors, pushing the total raise to “north of $120 billion” — easily the largest private funding round in history and a clear signal that an IPO is imminent.
Who’s Writing the Checks
The latest $10 billion tranche includes Andreessen Horowitz, D.E. Shaw Ventures, MGX, TPG, and T. Rowe Price. Notably, Microsoft — OpenAI’s longtime partner and computing provider — is also participating in this round.
The first wave of funding in February was even more staggering: Amazon invested $50 billion, while Nvidia and SoftBank each committed $30 billion. Amazon also announced a multi-year partnership that will expand its existing $38 billion cloud computing agreement with OpenAI by $100 billion over the next eight years.
The $730 billion pre-money valuation makes OpenAI more valuable than most publicly traded tech companies, all while still being private.
The Numbers Behind the Hype
OpenAI’s growth metrics are genuinely unprecedented. ChatGPT has amassed 900 million weekly active users, and the company generated roughly $13.1 billion in revenue last year. Enterprise revenue is growing fastest — currently at 40% of total revenue, expected to reach 50% by year-end.
“Serving other enterprises is a very profitable business at scale, and that’s how we will build a sustainable business model,” Friar said.
IPO Preparations
When asked about going public, Friar was characteristically careful but telling: “We’re starting to build that outcome. Over the long run, we have to build a company that’s ready to be a public company. This round derisks somewhat because we could be ready, but the market might not be ready for us.”
OpenAI has moderated its spending plans, reducing its total compute spend target from the $1.4 trillion Sam Altman touted last fall to approximately $600 billion through 2030 — still enormous, but more aligned with projected revenue growth.
The Sora shutdown announced the same day reinforces the IPO narrative: OpenAI is cutting non-essential products to focus on profitable enterprise tools. “We just are facing a lack of compute,” Friar explained. “We’re having to make those really difficult decisions.”
The Competition
OpenAI isn’t the only AI company racing toward an IPO. Anthropic closed a $30 billion round at a $380 billion valuation and is reportedly in talks for a 2026 public debut. The key difference: Anthropic derives 80% of its revenue from enterprise accounts versus OpenAI’s 40%, suggesting different business model maturities.
The Bottom Line
$120 billion raised privately, $730 billion valuation, 900 million users, $13 billion in revenue. These are numbers that would make most public companies jealous. But the question isn’t whether OpenAI can raise money — it’s whether it can turn all that capital into sustainable profits before the AI hype cycle cools. With Sam Altman already scaling back infrastructure ambitions from $1.4 trillion to $600 billion, the answer is less certain than the fundraise might suggest.