OpenAI is reportedly exploring a major secondary stock sale that could see its current and former employees cashing out around $6 billion in shares, confirming a previous report on the same. Investors in these discussions include SoftBank Group, Thrive Capital, and Dragoneer Investment Group, reports Bloomberg. If completed, this deal would value the AI company at about $500 billion, up from its recent $300 billion estimate, making it one of the most valuable startups in the world.
According to the report, the proposed sale is still in its early stages, and the final figures may change as negotiations progress. This secondary offering complements SoftBank’s involvement in OpenAI’s $40 billion primary funding round, through which the company has already secured $8.3 billion from investors. The secondary sale would allow employees to monetize a portion of their equity while the company continues to expand its capital base. But so far, SoftBank, Thrive Capital, and Dragoneer Investment Group have not publicly commented on the potential deal
Meanwhile, the stock sale also functions as a retention tool in a competitive AI job market. Only employees who have been with the company for at least two years are reportedly eligible to participate, allowing long-term team members to benefit from the company’s rising valuation.
This comes as OpenAI is aggressively expanding its operations, launching new products, and advancing its technology. The company recently launched GPT-5, a release that drew both strong interest and some criticism. Its ChatGPT now has about 700 million weekly users, up from 400 million earlier this year.
The company’s revenue has also doubled in the first seven months, reaching a projected $12 billion for the year and aiming for $20 billion by year-end. The company is said to be targeting $125 billion in revenue by 2029. Also, OpenAI (founded as a nonprofit in 2015) shifted to a capped-profit model in 2019 and is now transitioning its commercial arm into a Public Benefit Corporation (PBC) to raise more capital while maintaining nonprofit control.
The AI giant has also completed a $6.5 billion all-stock acquisition of io, an AI device startup backed by Jony Ive. Recently, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman reportedly announced that the company plans to invest ‘trillions’ of dollars in data centers and infrastructure to support the growing demand for AI computing power. But despite all this, OpenAI is facing its own challenges, with reports of growing tensions with its major backer, Microsoft, over revenue sharing and revising the AGI clause to extend access to advanced technologies.