OpenAI raises $122B as valuation hits $852B in record AI funding round
OpenAI has raised $122 billion in one of the largest AI funding rounds to date, pushing its valuation to $852 billion and reinforcing its position at the center of the global AI infrastructure race.
The update, shared by CFO Sarah Friar on LinkedIn, highlights how demand for enterprise AI, large-scale compute, and platforms such as ChatGPT is driving unprecedented levels of investment.
The OpenAI funding round brings together major technology partners and global investors, reflecting increasing competition to build and control AI infrastructure as adoption expands across industries, including education, workforce training, and enterprise software.
AI funding round backed by global investors and infrastructure partners
The OpenAI funding round is anchored by Amazon, NVIDIA, and SoftBank Group Corp., with continued support from Microsoft. SoftBank co-led alongside a16z, D. E. Shaw Ventures, MGX, TPG, and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, with additional participation from firms including BlackRock, Sequoia Capital, Fidelity, and Temasek.
In her post, Friar said: “Today, we officially closed our latest funding round with $122 billion in committed capital at a post money valuation of $852 billion.”
She added: “It’s a historic number. But for me, what matters more is what it represents.”
OpenAI is positioning the funding as a way to scale AI infrastructure and expand access to AI tools across individuals, developers, and enterprises.
Friar continued: “We’re building the core infrastructure for AI, making it possible for anyone, anywhere, to build. From individuals to the smallest business to the largest enterprise, this is about putting powerful tools into more hands and seeing what people create with them.”
The company also confirmed broader participation through bank distribution channels and inclusion in ARK Invest exchange-traded funds, signaling a shift toward wider access to AI-linked investment opportunities.
ChatGPT growth and enterprise AI adoption drive revenue scale
OpenAI reports continued growth across its consumer and enterprise AI platforms, with ChatGPT remaining the dominant application in the market.
The company states that ChatGPT has surpassed 900 million weekly active users and more than 50 million subscribers. It also reports that ChatGPT generates six times the monthly web visits and mobile sessions of the next largest AI app, with total AI usage significantly higher across the platform.
Revenue growth has followed adoption. OpenAI reached $1 billion in revenue within a year of launching ChatGPT, generated $1 billion per quarter by the end of 2024, and now reports approximately $2 billion in monthly revenue. Enterprise AI now accounts for more than 40 percent of revenue and is expected to reach parity with consumer by 2026.
Friar said: “OpenAI was the fastest technology platform to reach 10 million users, the fastest to 100 million users, and soon the fastest to one billion weekly active users.”
Developer activity is also scaling. OpenAI’s APIs now process more than 15 billion tokens per minute, while Codex serves over 2 million weekly users, reflecting rapid growth in AI-powered development and automation workflows.
AI infrastructure and compute strategy shape next phase
OpenAI is positioning compute and AI infrastructure as the central constraint in its next phase of growth, with the funding expected to accelerate expansion across cloud platforms, chip partnerships, and global data center capacity.
Friar pointed to compute as the limiting factor behind model development and product scale, framing it as the foundation behind recent gains in performance and reach: “Underpinning all of this is compute. It’s easy to talk about models and products, but compute is the engine behind it all. It’s what allows us to build better systems, move faster, and reach more people.”
The company is expanding its infrastructure strategy across multiple providers, including Microsoft, Oracle, AWS, and Google Cloud, alongside chip partnerships with NVIDIA, AMD, and Broadcom. The approach reflects growing demand for AI infrastructure capable of supporting enterprise deployment, real-time applications, and increasingly complex workloads.
Alongside this, OpenAI is consolidating its product ecosystem into a single interface, bringing together ChatGPT, Codex, and agent-based capabilities as part of a broader shift toward integrated AI systems.
Friar also outlined the direction of travel on the product side, pointing to a move toward a unified AI experience: “Looking ahead, we’re building an AI superapp - bringing ChatGPT, Codex, and agents into one place. Why it matters? This is how AI becomes truly useful.”
The combination of infrastructure investment, product integration, and platform scale suggests a model where consumer usage increasingly feeds enterprise adoption. This has implications for education and skills development, as AI tools move from standalone applications to embedded systems used across learning and workplace environments.
