OpenAI
Frontier LabAlso known as: OpenAI Inc, OpenAI LP, OpenAI Global LLC
Founded Dec 2015 (10 years old) by Sam Altman, Ilya Sutskever, Greg Brockman, Elon Musk, Wojciech Zaremba, and John Schulman
OpenAI is the AI research company that brought large language models into mainstream consciousness through ChatGPT. Founded in December 2015 as a non-profit with the mission to ensure artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity, OpenAI has undergone dramatic evolution - from non-profit to "capped-profit," from research lab to produc...
Revenue
$20 billion
as of 2025
Valuation
$500 billion
as of Oct 2025
Headcount
3,500
as of 2025
Total Funding Raised
$13 billion
as of Jan 2024
Key People
2
8 total tracked
AI Models
13
Funding History
4Growth RoundOct 2024
$6.6 billionat $157 billion valuationLed by Thrive Capital
Led by Thrive Capital; investors included Microsoft, NVIDIA, SoftBank, and others
wsj.com (opens in new tab)Microsoft ExtensionJan 2023
$10 billionLed by Microsoft AI
Microsoft's multi-year, multi-billion dollar investment reported at ~$10B; brought total Microsoft commitment to ~$13B
blogs.microsoft.com (opens in new tab)Microsoft InvestmentJul 2019
$1 billionLed by Microsoft AI
Microsoft's initial $1B investment; coincided with creation of capped-profit entity OpenAI LP
openai.com (opens in new tab)FoundingDec 2015
$1 billion
Initial $1B commitment from founders and backers including Elon Musk, Sam Altman, Peter Thiel, Reid Hoffman, Jessica Livingston
openai.com (opens in new tab)Key People
8Sam AltmanFounder
CEO
Mar 2019 – present
Co-chairman from founding (2015); became CEO when OpenAI LP was created in 2019. Briefly fired and reinstated in November 2023.
Wojciech ZarembaFounder
Co-founder, VP of Research
Dec 2015 – present
Leads codegen research; one of the few remaining co-founders as of 2025
Co-lead, Superalignment
Jul 2023 – May 2024
Co-led Superalignment team from its founding in July 2023; resigned May 2024 citing safety concerns, joined Anthropic
Mira Murati
CTO
2018 – Sep 2024
Served as interim CEO during Sam Altman's brief ousting in November 2023; departed September 2024
Ilya SutskeverFounder
Co-founder & Chief Scientist
Dec 2015 – Jun 2024
Left OpenAI in June 2024 to found Safe Superintelligence Inc (SSI)
Greg BrockmanFounder
President
Dec 2015 – Aug 2024
Co-founder and president; took leave of absence in August 2024
Elon MuskFounder
Co-chairman (board)
Dec 2015 – Feb 2018
Left the board in February 2018; later sued OpenAI alleging breach of founding agreement
John SchulmanFounder
Co-founder, Research
Dec 2015 – Aug 2024
Key contributor to RLHF and PPO; departed August 2024 to join Anthropic
Facts14
Financial
Market Share50%
Gross Margin35%
Valuation$500 billion
Revenue$20 billion
Headcount3,500
Total Funding Raised$13 billion
Products & Usage
Benchmark Score83
User Count100 million
Model Parameters175 billion
Organization
Legal StructurePublic Benefit Corporation (converting)
Founded DateDec 2015
HeadquartersSan Francisco, CA
People
Founded BySam Altman, Ilya Sutskever, Greg Brockman, Elon Musk, wojciech-zaremba, john-schulman
General
Websitehttps://openai.com/
AI Models (13)
View all models →| Model | Released | Pricing (in/out) | Context |
|---|---|---|---|
| o3 | Apr 2025 | $10 / $40 | 200K tokens |
| o4-mini | Apr 2025 | $1.1 / $4.4 | 200K tokens |
| GPT-4.1 | Apr 2025 | $2 / $8 | 1M tokens |
| GPT-4.1 mini | Apr 2025 | $0.4 / $1.6 | 1M tokens |
| GPT-4.1 nano | Apr 2025 | $0.1 / $0.4 | 1M tokens |
| o3-mini | Jan 2025 | $1.1 / $4.4 | 200K tokens |
| o1 | Dec 2024 | $15 / $60 | 200K tokens |
| o1-preview | Sep 2024 | $15 / $60 | 128K tokens |
| o1-mini | Sep 2024 | $3 / $12 | 128K tokens |
| GPT-4o mini | Jul 2024 | $0.15 / $0.6 | 128K tokens |
| GPT-4o | May 2024 | $2.5 / $10 | 128K tokens |
| GPT-4 Turbo | Nov 2023 | $10 / $30 | 128K tokens |
| GPT-4 | Mar 2023 | $30 / $60 | 8K tokens |