Overview

• Discussions are at an early stage and terms could change, according to multiple reports, and OpenAI declined to comment.
• The proposed transaction is a secondary sale that would let current and former employees cash out roughly $6 billion of stock to investors including SoftBank, Thrive Capital and Dragoneer.
• A $500 billion price tag would make OpenAI the most valuable privately held company, surpassing SpaceX’s latest valuation, per CB Insights.
• The talks follow a SoftBank-led commitment announced in March that implied a roughly $300 billion valuation through about $40 billion in funding expected to close by year-end.
• OpenAI reports rapid growth—about $12 billion projected 2025 revenue, roughly 700 million weekly users and around 5 million paying business users—while facing heavy costs, including a reported $8 billion cash burn this year, plus mixed reception to GPT-5 and intensifying competitive and regulatory pressures.