OpenAI valuation: Sam Altman-led AI company worth $500 billion

ChatGPT-maker OpenAI is now valued at $500 billion, after current and former employees sold roughly $6.6 billion worth of its shares, per a report by Reuters on Thursday.

The OpenAI employees sold shares to a consortium of investors, including Thrive Capital, SoftBank, Dragoneer Investment Group, Abu Dhabi's MGX and T.

The company had authorised sales of $10-billion-plus worth of stock on the secondary market, the report added. The share sale adds to SoftBank's earlier investment in OpenAI's $40 billion primary funding round.


OpenAI was last valued at $300 billion after having secured $8.3 billion in funding.

Softbank backing

Back in March, OpenAI shared plans to raise significant capital, with SoftBank expected to invest up to $30 billion by the end of the year. In the same month, the company had already raised $2.5 billion from venture capital firms, aiming to bring in another $7.5 billion before year-end.

SoftBank said in a release that it is on a mission to realise Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI) that surpasses human intelligence, and that OpenAI is the partner closest to achieving that goal.

"The advancement of OpenAI's AI models is key to achieving AGI and ASI, and massive computing power is essential," SoftBank stated in its rationale for the latest investment in the company.

OpenAI's strong financials

OpenAI generated around $4.3 billion in revenue in the first half of 2025, about 16% more than it generated all of last year, The Information reported on Monday.

Research and development cost the ChatGPT maker $6.7 billion in the first half, the report said, adding that it had about $17.5 billion in cash and securities at the end of the period.

OpenAI looks set to meet its full-year revenue target of $13 billion and a cash-burn target of $8.5 billion, the report added.

The company’s annual recurring revenue has jumped to $13 billion, up from $10 billion in June. It is expected to exceed $20 billion by the end of this year.

Meanwhile, the number of businesses paying to use ChatGPT has grown rapidly, rising from three million to five million in just a few months