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Thrive Capital Leads Purchase of OpenAI Employee Shares at $80 Billion Valuation

Chrissie Wong

20 October 2023

According to reports, Thrive Capital is spearheading an agreement to buy OpenAI employee stock, valuing the business at around $80 billion. This indicates a sharp increase in the AI research lab's valuation, which was $27 billion based on a comparable tender offer six months ago.

Despite the fact that OpenAI's new, stratospheric valuation is more than 60 times greater than its projected yearly sales of $1.3 billion, this indicates investor confidence in the company's potential. Since releasing the chatbot in late 2022, OpenAI has grown at a hockey stick rate, driven by the enormous popularity of ChatGPT and ongoing advancements in big language models. From $28 million in 2022 to an annualized pace that surpassed $1 billion as of this summer, revenue soared.

Following Thrive Capital's participation in OpenAI's $27 billion valuation in April, the tender offer maintains the company's momentum. Thrive, led by Josh Kushner, has demonstrated a preference for high-profile startup investments, having most recently made investments in Stripe and Ramp. The rumored $80 billion valuation shows that Thrive is willing to grow its OpenAI shares despite the exorbitant cost, dwarfing average multiples even for fast-growth tech companies.

OpenAI has a lot of momentum going into the end of 2023. The business revealed today that ChatGPT Plus and Enterprise now offer the most capable picture creation model, DALL-E 3. In order to introduce new tools and foster community within the AI community, OpenAI will have its first-ever developers conference in November of next month.

As it plots its ambitious route, the startup stays firmly in the AI limelight thanks to its blockbuster products and extremely high value. Nonetheless, OpenAI needs to keep coming up with new ideas to keep a step ahead of Anthropic and Google. However, the corporation now has enough cash in its war chest to continue pushing the limits of AI capability and safety.