OpenAI – the world’s leading artificial intelligence (AI) company – is planning an initial public offering (IPO) by the end of 2026. If successful, this will be the first tech unicorn to reach a valuation of $1,000 billion, marking a major turning point in the history of AI development.
OpenAI is expected to raise about $60 billion in new Capital in the IPO, according to three anonymous sources cited by Reuters. The filing is expected to be filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in the second half of 2026, a year earlier than the company's stated target of 2027.
A spokesperson for OpenAI said there is currently no official date for an IPO, as the company’s biggest priority remains the development of artificial general intelligence (AGI) – a technology that is expected to radically change the way humans interact with machines. “We are building a sustainable business and pursuing a mission to ensure AGI benefits all of humanity,” the spokesperson stressed.
$500 billion valuation – a stepping stone to $1 trillion ambition
On October 2, 2025, OpenAI became the world's most valuable startup after completing a secondary share sale, raising the company's valuation to $500 billion, surpassing billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX ($400 billion). In that deal, OpenAI employees sold a total of $6.6 billion in shares to large institutional investors - showing the company's huge appeal to the global financial community.
Experts say that OpenAI's IPO preparations are not only a financial step forward but also a signal that investment organizations are focusing their attention on the AI field, especially in the context of President Donald Trump's administration strongly promoting policies to encourage technological innovation to maintain America's leading position.
ChatGPT faces unexpected challenge from Chinese rivals
Despite its achievements, OpenAI still faces stiff competition in the global market. In a recent automated cryptocurrency trading competition, two Chinese AI chatbots – DeepSeek and Qwen3 Max – outperformed ChatGPT and Grok from X (owned by Elon Musk) in trading performance.
According to the results announced on October 22, DeepSeek was the only AI model to achieve a positive return of about 9%, while ChatGPT-5 fell to the bottom of the list with a loss of up to 66%. Notably, DeepSeek only spent $5.3 million on training, much lower than the $5.7 billion that OpenAI invested in R&D in the first half of 2025.
