Fiji Simo, CEO of Instacart Inc., speaks during an interview in San Francisco, March 3, 2022.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images
OpenAI is focusing employee and investor attention on its enterprise business as the artificial intelligence startup prepares to go public by the end of the year, CNBC has learned.
Fiji Simo, OpenAI’s CEO of applications, held an all-staff meeting last week and said the company is committed to supporting businesses and is “actively working” on productive use cases.
OpenAI sparked a generative AI boom with the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, with chatbots now supporting over 900 million weekly active users. However, the company is still competing to gain market share, especially in the enterprise space, away from rivals such as: google Anthropic is also considering an IPO.
“Our opportunity now is to turn these 900 million users into high-computing users,” Simo said, according to a partial transcript of the meeting reviewed by CNBC. “We do that by turning ChatGPT into a productivity tool.”
The Wall Street Journal first reported on the all-hands meeting.
Officials say an OpenAI IPO could happen as early as the fourth quarter of this year. The exact timing is still subject to change, said the official, who requested anonymity because the details are confidential.
CFO Sarah Friar is building OpenAI’s finance team ahead of its market debut, hiring former chief accounting officer Ajmea Dale. block, Cynthia Gaylor, former CFO docusignearly this year. As part of her role, Gaylor will oversee investor relations, according to a LinkedIn post.
In December, OpenAI declared a “Code Red” effort to improve ChatGPT amid increasing competition from Google and Anthropic. The company has temporarily withdrawn other investments in areas such as health, shopping and advertising.
Simo said at an all-hands meeting in March that OpenAI is working with as much urgency as it was in December, but said the company can’t declare everything an emergency.
“What’s really important for us right now is to stay focused and execute very well,” Simo said.
OpenAI is also working to outline clearer spending targets after an ambitious infrastructure rollout in late 2025 disrupted the market.
CNBC previously reported that instead of the $1.4 trillion figure that OpenAI CEO Sam Altman had touted, the company told investors in February that it was targeting total computing spending of about $600 billion by 2030.
OpenAI projects total revenue to exceed $280 billion in 2030, with roughly equal contributions from consumer and enterprise businesses. The $600 billion figure the company is offering is meant to be tied more directly to expected revenue growth.
Spotlight: OpenAI refocuses enterprise with all-hands meeting amid IPO drive
