OpenAI lands record $110 billion investment backed by Nvidia, Amazon, and SoftBank

[Skye Jacobs]

What just happened? OpenAI has secured commitments for a funding round of up to $110 billion, pushing its valuation to $730 billion. The investment – anchored by Nvidia, Amazon, and SoftBank – cements the ChatGPT developer's position as the most heavily backed company in the global artificial intelligence race.

People familiar with the matter told the Financial Times that the deal marks a major step toward a potential initial public offering later this year, even amid warnings of speculative excess across the AI sector. The scale dwarfs previous records, including Anthropic's $30 billion funding earlier this year and OpenAI's own $41 billion raise in 2025, which at the time was the largest in the startup world.

Unlike traditional venture rounds, most of OpenAI's new financing comes from strategic corporate investors rather than venture capital firms. Nvidia and SoftBank each committed $30 billion, to be paid in three installments, while Amazon pledged $15 billion upfront and another $35 billion contingent on either an IPO or the development of artificial general intelligence.

That investment ties directly to a sweeping new partnership unveiled Friday: OpenAI will spend $100 billion over eight years on Amazon's chips and computing power, supplementing an existing $38 billion agreement. The companies also plan to co-develop a custom AI model for Amazon's consumer ecosystem.

OpenAI said that its long-standing arrangement with Microsoft, its largest shareholder, remains intact, including Microsoft's exclusive license to OpenAI's core intellectual property.

Image credit: the Financial Times

A portion of the new funding, roughly $10 billion, is expected to come from sovereign wealth funds and global investment firms now finalizing commitments. OpenAI's balance sheet already holds about $40 billion, money that will continue to fund losses through the end of the decade. Executives project positive free cash flow by 2030, contingent on securing enough compute capacity to support expansion.

Most of the incoming capital will be funneled into data center buildouts, chip purchases, and cloud contracts with investors like Amazon and Nvidia. The company's non-profit affiliate, the OpenAI Foundation, may also sell up to $10 billion worth of its $180 billion stake to finance additional grantmaking and recruitment efforts.

OpenAI was valued at $500 billion as recently as October during an employee stock sale, and its financial forecasts remain ambitious. Revenues reached roughly $13 billion last year and are expected to double to $30 billion in 2026, possibly surpassing $60 billion by 2027, according to a person with knowledge of internal projections. These figures depend heavily on OpenAI's access to computational resources.

Permalink to story:

OpenAI lands record $110 billion investment backed by Nvidia, Amazon, and SoftBank

 

[James321]

They just scared if OpenAI crashes and burns...wont take long before the entire AI POPS and everyone will crash and burn that heavily invested in AI.

This is just delaying the inevitable AI bubble to pop.

 

[ScottSoapbox]

Boo. OpenAI has more runway now to continue the reckless spending. But unless something significant changes they are still crashing before takeoff.

 

[winjer]

This waste of money doesn't stop...

 

[Theinsanegamer]

Remind me, how much did Softbank lose on WeWork again?

 

[pnntmp]

They just scared if OpenAI crashes and burns...wont take long before the entire AI POPS and everyone will crash and burn that heavily invested in AI.

This is just delaying the inevitable AI bubble to pop.

This is a ... less than well though out comment.
If you're scared a company will crash and burn, do you invest in it?

 

[JMGuy]

WHY?! ChatGPT, of all the AI models I’ve used, is one of the worst. It returns too many inaccuracies, and, as a useful tool, just one of the most irritating models available to use IMO.

 

[bviktor]

...and still absolutely no idea how to turn the company profitable.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

This is a ... less than well though out comment.
If you're scared a company will crash and burn, do you invest in it?

When a crash would result in trillions of losses? Yes.

The markets have no sense of rationality. Money will be shoveled in a desperate attempt to make line go up.

 

[Rumiku]

The masses have yet to buy into it, in concept. Even if users begin to use it daily, I see very few, if any, paying even the bare minimum, for what this costs to run, let alone enough to turn a profit.

It will be a tool for some, an unused feature for most, and a bubble that will take many of these companies begging for their original bread and butter customers back, whom they shunned, shuttered or mocked.

 

[airbornex]

Nvidia invests $30B so OpenAI can buy more Nvidia GPUs, Amazon invests $50B so OpenAI can spend $100B on Amazon compute. This is less a funding round and more a very expensive circular economy powered entirely by data centers and vibes.

 

[Taroo]

Please POP. We're tired of them burning money to just heat up the planet.

 

[pnntmp]

When a crash would result in trillions of losses? Yes.

The markets have no sense of rationality. Money will be shoveled in a desperate attempt to make line go up.

What trillions of dollars? None of these companies invested trillions, this investment is their biggest to date ... and according to you they are ready to waste the money in order to save their prior, smaller investments.

BTW the line is going up on its own, without desperate attempts.
Even if it were necessary "to make line go up", why doing it with 100+ billion when a tiny fraction of that would be enough???

 

[acrossthestars]

This is a ... less than well though out comment.
If you're scared a company will crash and burn, do you invest in it?

There's two reasons to invest in a company: it's got good fundamentals and shows serious potential. Those are the investments that make fortunes. On the flip side, it has absolutely abominable fundamentals, but you've already lost so much money, that a loss for them is a loss for you and makes you look bad by proxy. That's not an investment, that's risk aversion. That's a face-saving maneuver. OpenAI is the poster child of "throwing good money after bad", or maybe it's "bad money after worse". These companies are not throwing more money at OpenAI because they believe in the mission. They're doing so, to not look like complete bag holders.

It's all or nothing. Either this gambit eventually pays off and the CEOs look like mad geniuses, or it goes horribly wrong, and they just look mad.

 

[pnntmp]

There's two reasons to invest in a company: it's got good fundamentals and shows serious potential. Those are the investments that make fortunes. On the flip side, it has absolutely abominable fundamentals, but you've already lost so much money, that a loss for them is a loss for you and makes you look bad by proxy. That's not an investment, that's risk aversion. That's a face-saving maneuver. OpenAI is the poster child of "throwing good money after bad", or maybe it's "bad money after worse". These companies are not throwing more money at OpenAI because they believe in the mission. They're doing so, to not look like complete bag holders.

It's all or nothing. Either this gambit eventually pays off and the CEOs look like mad geniuses, or it goes horribly wrong, and they just look mad.

So they do risk aversion by increasing the risk ???
And invest ever increasing amounts of money that they are sure they will lose (at least according to you) just to save face????

Before ascribing madness to someone, take a moment to think. Especially if the alleged crazies are 3 of the most successful businesses to ever exist. Maybe it's you who's wrong?
Or maybe you're right, actually, because you see "serious potential" as a reason to invest. OpenAI is at the forefront of the greatest technological transformation of our lifetime, and quite possibly of all time. Don't you see some "serious potential" in that?