OpenAI
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Investors
Founders
About
OpenAI was founded on December 11, 2015, as a non-profit artificial intelligence research organization dedicated to developing artificial general intelligence (AGI) that benefits all of humanity 1. The founding team included Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Greg Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, Wojciech Zaremba, John Schulman, and several others 1. The organization launched with $1 billion in pledged funding from private investors including Musk, Altman, and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel 1. In 2019, OpenAI created a “capped-profit” subsidiary, OpenAI Global LLC, to attract investment capital while maintaining its non-profit parent structure 2. Microsoft made its first investment of $1 billion in July 2019 3. By 2023, Microsoft had committed approximately $13 billion in total investment 4. OpenAI launched ChatGPT in November 2022, which became the fastest-growing consumer application in history 1. The company has been headquartered in San Francisco, California since its founding 1. Ron Conway and SV Angel were early backers of OpenAI, with Topher Conway of SV Angel working closely with the company 5. During the November 2023 board crisis when Sam Altman was briefly fired, Ron Conway was a vocal supporter who helped Altman return to the company 6.
Funding History
| Round | Date | Amount | Valuation | Lead Investor | Key Co-Investors |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grant/Seed | Dec 2015 | $130M | N/A | N/A | Elon Musk, Sam Altman, Peter Thiel, Reid Hoffman, AWS 1 |
| OpenAI LP capped-profit launch | 2019-03-11 | ~$50M (Khosla) | $1B | Khosla Ventures | Reid Hoffman’s charitable organization 1314 |
| Series D (Microsoft) | Jul 2019 | $1B | N/A | Microsoft | N/A 3 |
| Microsoft Investment | Jan 2023 | $10B | $29B | Microsoft | N/A 3 |
| Series E (Tender Offer) | 2023-04-28 | ~$300M | $27B–$29B | Thrive Capital | Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Tiger Global, Founders Fund, K2 Global 71516 |
| Series E (extension) | Oct 2024 | $6.6B | $157B | Thrive Capital | Microsoft, NVIDIA, SoftBank, Khosla Ventures, Altimeter Capital, Fidelity, MGX 7 |
| Series F | Mar 2025 | $40B | $300B | SoftBank | Microsoft, Coatue, Altimeter Capital, Thrive Capital, Magnetar Capital, Founders Fund, Dragoneer 4 |
| Series F (extension) | Aug 2025 | $8.3B | $300B | Dragoneer | Blackstone, TPG, T. Rowe Price, Andreessen Horowitz, Coatue, D1 Capital, Fidelity, Founders Fund, Sequoia Capital, Tiger Global 8 |
| Secondary/Tender | Oct 2025 | $6.6B | $500B | N/A | Various 7 |
| Mega-Round | Feb 2026 | $110B | $730B (pre-money) | SoftBank | Amazon ($50B), NVIDIA ($30B) 9 |
| Mega-Round (Pre-IPO) | 2026-03-31 | $122B | $852B | SoftBank, Andreessen Horowitz | Amazon, Microsoft, NVIDIA; ~$3B from retail investors via ARK Invest-managed funds 12 |
What Investors Say
“What happened at OpenAI today is a Board coup that we have not seen the likes of since 1985 when the then-Apple board pushed out Steve Jobs. It is shocking; it is irresponsible; and it does not do right by Sam & Greg or all the builders in OpenAI.” – Ron Conway, posted on X, November 18, 2023 6
“It is reckless and irresponsible for a board to fire a founder over emotional reasons.” – Ron Conway to Time magazine, December 2023 6
What Founders Say
“We started OpenAI almost nine years ago because we believed that AGI was possible, and that it could be the most impactful technology in human history. We wanted to figure out how to build it and make it broadly beneficial.” – Sam Altman, blog post “Reflections,” 2024 10
“The economic growth in front of us looks astonishing, and we can now imagine a world where we cure all diseases, have much more time to enjoy with our families, and can fully realize our creative potential.” – Sam Altman, blog post “Reflections,” 2024 10
Sam Altman has publicly credited Ron Conway and Brian Chesky (Airbnb CEO) with saving OpenAI during the November 2023 board crisis, saying they were “in the foxhole” with him and “stopped me from making several mistakes” 11.
Sources
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Britannica Money, “OpenAI | ChatGPT, Sam Altman, Microsoft, & History,” accessed March 2026. https://www.britannica.com/money/OpenAI↩↩↩↩↩↩
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MIT Technology Review, “The messy, secretive reality behind OpenAI’s bid to save the world,” February 2020. https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/02/17/844721/ai-openai-moonshot-elon-musk-sam-altman-greg-brockman-messy-secretive-reality/↩
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Tracxn, “OpenAI - Funding Rounds & List of Investors,” accessed March 2026. https://tracxn.com/d/companies/openai/__kElhSG7uVGeFk1i71Co9-nwFtmtyMVT7f-YHMn4TFBg/funding-and-investors↩↩↩
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CNBC, “OpenAI closes $40 billion funding round, largest private tech deal on record,” March 2025. https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/31/openai-closes-40-billion-in-funding-the-largest-private-fundraise-in-history-softbank-chatgpt.html↩↩
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SV Angel website, “Team,” accessed March 2026. https://svangel.com/about/team↩
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Hacker News discussion, “Angel investor Ron Conway wrote…,” November 2023. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=383222↩↩↩
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TexAu, “How Much Did OpenAI Raise? Funding & Key Investors,” accessed March 2026. https://www.texau.com/profiles/openai↩↩↩
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Fortune, “OpenAI’s latest funding round was so popular early investors were reportedly miffed,” August 2025. https://fortune.com/2025/08/01/openai-funding-oversubscribed-early-investors-new-partners-dragoneer/↩
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TechCrunch, “OpenAI raises $110B in one of the largest private funding rounds in history,” February 2026. https://techcrunch.com/2026/02/27/openai-raises-110b-in-one-of-the-largest-private-funding-rounds-in-history/↩
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Sam Altman blog, “Reflections,” 2024. https://blog.samaltman.com/reflections↩↩
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Fortune, “Sam Altman says Airbnb’s Brian Chesky and SV Angel’s Ron Conway saved OpenAI,” January 2025. https://fortune.com/2025/01/06/sam-altman-airbnb-ceo-brian-chesky-sv-angel-ron-conway-saved-openai/↩
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TechCrunch, “OpenAI, not yet public, raises $3B from retail investors in monster $122B fund raise,” March 31, 2026. https://techcrunch.com/2026/03/31/openai-not-yet-public-raises-3b-from-retail-investors-in-monster-122b-fund-raise/↩
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“OpenAI LP,” OpenAI announcement, March 11, 2019, accessed May 2026. https://openai.com/index/openai-lp/ — Announces capped-profit OpenAI LP entity with Khosla Ventures and Reid Hoffman’s charitable organization as inaugural outside investors. ↩
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VentureBeat, “OpenAI launches new company for funding safe artificial general intelligence,” March 11, 2019, accessed May 2026. https://venturebeat.com/ai/openai-launches-new-company-for-funding-safe-artificial-general-intelligence — Contemporaneous press confirming Khosla Ventures and Reid Hoffman’s charitable organization as initial investors. Per Fortune (Dec 2023), Khosla wrote a $50M check at $1B valuation for ~5%, calling it “the largest initial bet I’ve made in 40 years by a factor of two.” ↩
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TechCrunch, “OpenAI closes $300M share sale at $27B-29B valuation,” April 28, 2023, accessed May 2026. https://techcrunch.com/2023/04/28/openai-funding-valuation-chatgpt/ — Confirms VCs (Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz, Thrive, K2 Global, Founders Fund) “have put in just over $300 million at a valuation of $27 billion – $29 billion” in tender offer separate from Microsoft’s January 2023 investment. ↩
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Crunchbase News, “What You Need To Know About OpenAI’s $300M Share Sale,” April/May 2023, accessed May 2026. https://news.crunchbase.com/ai-robotics/openais-300m-share-sale/ — Independent confirmation of $300M tender offer at $27B–$29B valuation; lists Tiger Global, Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital, Thrive Capital, and K2 Global as participants. ↩