新闻来源：www.nytimes.com
原文地址：OpenAI in Talks That Value Company at $150 Billion
新闻日期：2024-09-11
OpenAI正在谈判一项约650亿美元的融资计划，目标估值约为1500亿美元，这比九个月前的估值高出近700亿美元。
OpenAI正加速筹集资金以达到约1500亿美元的估值，投资机构Thrive Capital可能将领导新一轮的投资。苹果、NVIDIA和微软等技术巨头也参与了讨论。
OpenAI的增长得益于2022年推出的聊天机器人ChatGPT。全球A.I.初创公司的融资热潮随后开始降温。
但OpenAI仍在继续推进，并通过这次的融资表明科技行业对A.I.领域的紧迫需求。
如果这笔新融资完成，OpenAI将比SpaceX和Intel更值钱，甚至估值将超过前者一倍以上。
近期，OpenAI面临一些公开的发展挑战，有人担忧其研发的A.I.技术可能影响人类安全。
原文摘要：
OpenAI is in talks to raise about $6.5 billion as part of a deal that would value the company in the vicinity of $150 billion, a nearly $70 billion increase from its valuation nine months ago, according to five people with knowledge of the conversations.The deal would make the company more valuable than any other private company with the exception of ByteDance, the maker the video-sharing app TikTok.As recently as last week, OpenAI was looking to raise about $1 billion at a $100 billion valuation. But in the last few days, the company, which has extraordinarily high expenses because of the computing power needed to build big A.I. systems, has appeared to race past that goal.The new funding round would be led by the investment firm Thrive Capital, which has previously invested in OpenAI. The tech giants Apple, Nvidia and Microsoft have also been part of the discussions, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the nature of the discussions.Bloomberg reported earlier on the new valuation talks.In late 2022, OpenAI started the artificial intelligence boom with the release of its online chatbot, ChatGPT, inciting a global surge in funding for start-ups that built similar technology. Interest in such companies dropped this summer as a series of prominent companies all but disappeared into wealthier and more powerful A.I. companies like Google, Microsoft and Amazon.But OpenAI, backed by $13 billion from Microsoft and with name recognition far beyond its start-up rivals, has continued to build on the frenzy of the ChatGPT release. And its new, rapidly expanding investment round is a statement on the urgency the tech industry still places on artificial intelligence.If the new deal is completed, OpenAI will be more valuable than SpaceX, the private rocket company founded by Elon Musk (who was also one of OpenAI’s co-founders). It would also be nearly twice as valuable as Intel, the venerable chip giant, whose total market value has slipped to around $83 billion as it has been unable to keep up with the A.I. boom.Over the past nine months, OpenAI, which has more than 1,700 employees, has added over 1,000 new workers and released increasingly powerful versions of ChatGPT and similar technologies, including systems that generate images and videos.Still, OpenAI has had very public growing pains. Company executives are still trying to repair OpenAI’s reputation after four board members unexpectedly fired the chief executive, Sam Altman, in late 2023. Since his reinstatement just five days later, the company has lost several high-profile employees, including the chief scientist and co-founder Ilya Sutskever.Dr. Sutskever and other experts in the field, including some former and current OpenAI employees, have become increasingly concerned that the kind of technologies developed by OpenAI could help spread disinformation, contribute to cyberattacks or even endanger humanity. OpenAI has repeatedly acknowledged those concerns, and it has worked to revamp its efforts to ensure that its technologies are safe.(The New York Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft in December for copyright infringement of news content related to A.I. systems.)OpenAI is also working to transform its A.I. technologies into products that pull in revenue. Building this kind of technology requires billions of dollars in raw computing power, and by some estimates the company is burning through $7 billion every year.Now, tech analysts say, OpenAI needs to show that it can be more than a money pit for investors and can operate more like a traditional tech company.OpenAI is pulling in more than $2 billion a year through subscriptions to ChatGPT and other technologies, according to a person familiar with its finances. It has also hired seasoned Silicon Valley executives like Sarah Friar, a former chief financial officer of Square, and Kevin Weil, a former chief product officer of Twitter, to help transform itself from an A.I. research lab into a profit-producing operation.Mr. Altman, who is admired by peers in Silicon Valley for his fund-raising ability, has strategically built investor enthusiasm for opportunities to buy stakes in OpenAI. His strategy has been to sell existing shares in a so-called tender offer once a year, which benefits the company’s employees, while later complementing that with a traditional funding round to support OpenAI’s business, a person familiar with Mr. Altman’s approach said.Last year, as he wrapped up a tender offer that valued the company at more than $80 billion, he was already telling investors that he planned to raise money to value it at $100 billion. That round continues to expand.
