OpenAI Seeks $30 Billion After Calling Off Its IPO
Trending Topics Jakob Steinschaden ● Covered by 7 sources
OpenAI is trying to raise at least $30 billion privately after pushing its IPO to 2027 or later. The money would help fund its huge data-center buildout as losses keep piling up.
Based on reporting by Trending Topics, Jakob Steinschaden — read the original for the full story.
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OpenAI is back in private fundraising mode. Bloomberg says the company is seeking at least $30 billion in a new round at a valuation of roughly $1.4 trillion, a jump from the $1.2 trillion level that had been floating around only days earlier. The round is being treated as a bridge to the public market, but that market keeps moving farther away: OpenAI has now pushed its IPO back to 2027 at the earliest.
The company’s appetite for cash is not exactly subtle. In March, it closed a record $122 billion round at an $852 billion valuation, with SoftBank, Amazon and Nvidia among the backers. That had been framed as the last private stop before an IPO. Instead, OpenAI now needs another giant check just to keep the machine moving, while annualized revenue has climbed above $40 billion and risen about 70 percent since July, helped mainly by AI coding tools.
The reason is infrastructure, and lots of it. OpenAI expects cumulative negative free cash flow of $278 billion through the end of 2030, according to an internal presentation cited by the Financial Times. Altman has argued that the delay is not really about markets at all, but about the debate over AI safety. His line was blunt: a listing now would be “ill-advised.”
That hesitation lands at a rough moment. The IPO market has cooled, and several would-be listings are already stepping back. Oura postponed its Nasdaq debut despite what it described as strong demand. SoftBank’s SB Energy delayed too. Nscale may also push its roadshow. Investors are juggling rate hikes, geopolitical tension and the usual A.I. whiplash, which is not a fun combo for fresh listings.
SoftBank is especially exposed to the whole thing. It is OpenAI’s biggest single investor and committed up to $30 billion in the March round, paid in tranches. Some of that is being financed with debt, including $11.15 billion in bonds that Fitch rates BB+. SoftBank also has SB Energy tied up in OpenAI’s data-center demand, so an OpenAI IPO would have helped it show the market what all that paper is actually worth. That wait just got longer.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
This is what happens when a company’s burn rate is doing laps around public-market patience. OpenAI is acting less like a startup and more like a utility with a trillion-dollar mood board, and that usually ends with someone else paying for the power lines. The real tell is not the valuation; it’s that the IPO keeps getting kicked down the road while the cash asks get larger.
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