OpenAI Raises $122 Billion in Funding, Company Valuation Reaches $852 Billion

$3 Billion Raised from Individual Investors

To Be Included in ARK Invest ETF

OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, announced on March 31 (local time) that it has raised a total of $122 billion (approximately KRW 184 trillion) in its most recent funding round, which was announced last month. As a result, the company’s valuation has reached $852 billion (about KRW 1,284 trillion). This is an increase of $12 billion from the $110 billion in investment announced last month, marking the largest funding round since OpenAI's founding.

According to Bloomberg, the majority of this funding came from three major big tech companies. Amazon invested $50 billion, while Nvidia and SoftBank each invested $30 billion. However, a significant portion of Amazon's investment—$35 billion—will only be provided if OpenAI goes public through an IPO or achieves artificial general intelligence (AGI). In addition, venture capital firms such as Andreessen Horowitz and D. E. Shaw Ventures, as well as MGX, an AI-focused investment firm based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), also participated.

OpenAI logo. Photo by Reuters Yonhap News Agency

For the first time, OpenAI attracted $3 billion from individual investors through banking channels in this round of funding. The company will also be included in the exchange-traded fund (ETF) of ARK Invest, an asset management company operated by Cathie Wood—known as "Donnamu Unni" in Korea. This is a strategy to allow more investors to invest in OpenAI. In addition, the company announced that it has expanded its bank loan limit to $4.7 billion to secure greater investment flexibility.

Sarah Friar, Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of OpenAI, commented on this fundraising, stating, "It surpasses even the largest IPOs in history," and explained that, despite increased uncertainty in the public offering market due to factors such as the war in Iran, OpenAI has secured the flexibility to invest in computing resources and its AI roadmap. OpenAI had previously announced plans to invest over $1.4 trillion in physical infrastructure to support its AI software over the next several years.

OpenAI stated that it currently generates monthly revenue of $2 billion and that its revenue growth is four times faster than Alphabet (Google’s parent company) and Meta at similar stages of development. ChatGPT’s weekly active users (WAU) have surpassed 900 million, and the number of paid subscribers has exceeded 50 million. The company also reported that enterprise sales now account for 40% of total revenue, with expectations for this figure to rise to 50% by the end of the year. Notably, weekly users of Codex, the enterprise coding tool, have increased fivefold over the past three months to exceed 2 million, as OpenAI is building an AI super application (app) that integrates ChatGPT, Codex, and a web browser.

Meanwhile, OpenAI has recently suspended the development of certain features, including the video generation app "Sora," in an effort to reduce costs and improve computational efficiency. Industry analysts view this as a strategy to focus on improving results ahead of a potential IPO expected later this year.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.