OpenAI
American artificial intelligence research and product company behind ChatGPT and the GPT model family, founded in 2015 as a nonprofit and restructured twice, in 2019 and 2025, with Microsoft as its largest outside investor and Sam Altman as chief executive.
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- Established
- 2015-12-11
- Location
- San Francisco, California, United States
- Country
- United States
- Founded
- December 11, 2015, announced as a nonprofit AI research organization
- Founders named in reporting
- Sam Altman and Elon Musk (both described as investors/co-founders), Greg Brockman (chief technology officer) and Ilya Sutskever (research director), with Peter Thiel named as one of the private investors who funded the launch (not as a co-founder)
- Initial funding
- An announced $1 billion commitment from private investors
- Chief executive
- Sam Altman, since 2019 (removed by the board and reinstated within a week in November 2023)
- Structure (as of October 2025)
- The nonprofit OpenAI Foundation controls OpenAI Group, a for-profit public benefit corporation
- Largest outside investor
- Microsoft, holding a 27% stake reported at roughly $135 billion, from a cumulative $13.8 billion invested
- Reported valuation
- $500 billion, following an October 2025 secondary share sale
- Flagship product
- ChatGPT, launched November 30, 2022
- Stated mission
- "Ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity"stated by the subject
Overview
OpenAI is an American artificial intelligence research and product company, announced on December 11, 2015, as a nonprofit organization backed by roughly $1 billion in pledged funding from private investors (MIT Technology Review; Britannica Money). It is best known as the developer of ChatGPT and the GPT family of large language models, and its chief executive since 2019 has been Sam Altman, who was briefly removed and then reinstated by the company’s board in November 2023. As of October 2025, OpenAI operates as a for-profit public benefit corporation, OpenAI Group, controlled by the nonprofit OpenAI Foundation, with Microsoft as its largest outside shareholder (Al Jazeera). OpenAI describes its mission as working to “ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity” (OpenAI).
Founding
Individuals named as OpenAI’s founders or earliest backers in the sources read for this profile include Sam Altman and Elon Musk, both described as investors and co-founders; Greg Brockman, who became chief technology officer; Ilya Sutskever, who became research director; and Peter Thiel, named as one of the private investors — alongside Musk and Altman — who funded the launch; MIT Technology Review’s own account distinguishes these financial backers from the operational co-founders and does not itself call Thiel a co-founder (MIT Technology Review). The organization’s original stated aim was to “build value for everyone rather than shareholders” and to hold “a primary fiduciary duty to humanity” while safely developing artificial general intelligence (MIT Technology Review).
Musk left OpenAI’s board on February 23, 2018. OpenAI’s own blog post at the time gave the reason as avoiding a looming conflict of interest, stating, “As Tesla continues to become more focused on AI, this will eliminate a potential future conflict for Elon,” and said he would continue to donate to and advise the organization (Business Standard).
Restructuring and the Microsoft partnership
In 2019, OpenAI moved from a pure nonprofit to a hybrid structure with a “capped-profit” commercial arm, after concluding that the cost of its research would exceed what conventional nonprofit fundraising could sustain. Microsoft invested $1 billion that year and became OpenAI’s cloud-computing partner (Britannica Money). Microsoft expanded its stake with a further, reported $10 billion investment confirmed on January 23, 2023, on top of its 2019 investment and an additional round in 2021 (Bloomberg).
OpenAI completed a further restructuring on October 28, 2025, converting into a public benefit corporation — OpenAI Group — controlled by a nonprofit, the OpenAI Foundation. Microsoft received a 27% stake in the new structure, reported at approximately $135 billion, on a cumulative $13.8 billion it had invested since 2019, and committed to a reported $250 billion Azure cloud-services agreement; the commercial partnership is set to run at least through 2032, with Microsoft retaining certain rights to OpenAI’s models even after any future declaration of artificial general intelligence. OpenAI Foundation board chair Bret Taylor said the new arrangement meant “the nonprofit remains in control of the for-profit, and now has a direct path to major resources before AGI arrives” (Al Jazeera).
ChatGPT and scale
OpenAI released ChatGPT, based on GPT-3.5, as a free research preview on November 30, 2022. It reached an estimated 100 million monthly users within about two months — faster than TikTok (nine months) or Instagram (roughly two and a half years) took to reach the same milestone (History.com). At OpenAI’s first developer conference on November 6, 2023, Altman announced that ChatGPT had reached 100 million weekly active users and that more than 2 million developers, across over 92% of Fortune 500 companies, were building on OpenAI’s platform; the company also introduced GPT-4 Turbo, customizable “GPTs,” an Assistants API and a planned GPT Store (TechCrunch).
By October 2025, OpenAI’s valuation had grown substantially: a $6.6 billion secondary sale of current and former employees’ stock, completed October 2, 2025, to a group including Thrive Capital, SoftBank, Dragoneer Investment Group, Abu Dhabi’s MGX and T. Rowe Price, valued the company at $500 billion — up from $300 billion in an earlier 2025 funding round led by SoftBank, and enough to make OpenAI, according to Bloomberg, “the world’s largest startup,” surpassing SpaceX (Bloomberg).
The November 2023 board crisis
On November 17, 2023, OpenAI’s board removed Sam Altman as chief executive and Greg Brockman as board chair. The board did not give a detailed public explanation; one contemporaneous account described the dispute as rooted in “apparent differences of balancing safety with artificial intelligence with the desire to release new AI tools into the world,” and NPR’s reporting the following week likewise found no more specific public reasoning had been offered (NPR; PBS NewsHour). Brockman resigned from OpenAI in protest (PBS NewsHour). Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati served as interim CEO for part of the crisis and later said she had raised concerns internally about “a race to the bottom on safety,” while ultimately supporting Altman’s return (Fortune).
Within days, an estimated 97% of OpenAI’s employees signed a letter threatening to resign unless the board reversed its decision (NPR). On November 21, 2023, OpenAI reinstated Altman as CEO under a reconstituted board chaired by former Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor and including former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and Quora CEO Adam D’Angelo (PBS NewsHour).
Leadership departures after the crisis
Two of OpenAI’s other original leaders left within the following year. Chief scientist and co-founder Ilya Sutskever, who had been on the board that voted to remove Altman, left OpenAI in May 2024; on June 19, 2024, he launched a new company, Safe Superintelligence Inc., with co-founders Daniel Gross (a former Y Combinator partner) and Daniel Levy (a former OpenAI engineer) (TechCrunch). On September 25, 2024, Mira Murati announced her own resignation as CTO after more than six years, saying she wanted “to create the time and space to do my own exploration”; OpenAI’s Vice President of Research, Barret Zoph, and its Chief Research Officer, Bob McGrew, departed the same day, with Altman saying the three had “made these decisions independently of each other and amicably” (Fortune).
OpenAI’s departures also seeded a rival: Anthropic, a competing AI company known for its Claude models, was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, both described as former OpenAI executives who left over concerns about AI safety (Britannica).
The Musk lawsuit
Elon Musk sued OpenAI, Sam Altman and Microsoft, alleging that Altman and Brockman committed a “breach of charitable trust” — that Musk had helped fund a nonprofit meant to benefit humanity, and that its 2019 shift toward a for-profit structure instead benefited insiders. OpenAI’s defense argued that Musk himself had supported creating the for-profit subsidiary to attract the investment OpenAI needed, and characterized the suit as driven by competitive rivalry, noting Musk had founded the competing AI company xAI roughly eighteen months before filing suit; OpenAI attorney Sarah Eddy also argued that Musk’s initial contribution had come “with no strings attached,” so there was no charitable trust to enforce (NPR).
On May 18, 2026, a nine-member federal jury in the Northern District of California unanimously dismissed all of Musk’s claims in under two hours, finding he had waited too long to sue; the verdict turned on the statute of limitations and did not resolve whether a breach of the founding agreement had actually occurred. Presiding judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers said, “I think there’s a substantial amount of evidence to support the jury’s finding.” Musk’s lead attorney, Marc Toberoff, said, “This one is not over,” indicating he would appeal (NPR).
The 2026 Navier–Stokes claim
In September 2026, OpenAI announced that an internal AI system had produced a proof concerning one branch of the Navier–Stokes Millennium Prize problem, a claim that drew both mathematical interest and a public dispute over credit and verification. That episode is covered in a dedicated profile: OpenAI’s 2026 Navier–Stokes Millennium Prize claim.
What this profile does not claim
This profile does not assert a complete or authoritative list of OpenAI’s founders; it names only the individuals identified by name in the sources read for it and notes that sources vary in how they characterize each person’s role (founder, investor, or both). It does not state a more specific reason for the November 2023 board’s removal of Sam Altman than what was reported at the time, since no source read for this profile documents the board’s full internal reasoning. It does not confirm whether Elon Musk’s attorney formally filed the appeal announced after the May 2026 verdict, or that verdict’s later status. Valuation figures given here — the $500 billion valuation and Microsoft’s approximately $135 billion stake — are tied to transactions completed in October 2025 and are not asserted to be current as of any later date. Finally, this profile does not evaluate the correctness or acceptance of OpenAI’s September 2026 Navier–Stokes claim; that is addressed, with its own sourcing and caveats, in the linked event profile.
Timeline
- 2015-12-11
- OpenAI is announced as a nonprofit AI research organization backed by roughly $1 billion in pledged funding from private investors, with Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Greg Brockman and Ilya Sutskever among the individuals named as founders in contemporaneous and later reporting.
- 2018-02-23
- Elon Musk departs OpenAI's board. OpenAI states in its own blog post that, "As Tesla continues to become more focused on AI, this will eliminate a potential future conflict for Elon," and that Musk would continue to donate and advise the organization.
- 2019
- OpenAI restructures from a pure nonprofit into a hybrid model with a "capped-profit" arm, after concluding its costs would exceed what standard nonprofit fundraising could support; Microsoft invests $1 billion and becomes OpenAI's cloud-computing partner.
- 2022-11-30
- OpenAI releases ChatGPT, built on GPT-3.5, as a free research preview; it reaches an estimated 100 million monthly users within about two months, faster than TikTok (nine months) or Instagram (roughly two and a half years) took to do the same.
- 2023-01-23
- Microsoft confirms a further multibillion-dollar investment, reported at $10 billion, extending a partnership that began with $1 billion in 2019 and an additional round in 2021.
- 2023-11-06
- At OpenAI's first developer conference, Sam Altman announces ChatGPT has reached 100 million weekly active users, with more than 2 million developers building on OpenAI's platform; the company unveils GPT-4 Turbo, custom "GPTs," an Assistants API and a planned GPT Store.
- 2023-11-17
- OpenAI's board removes Sam Altman as CEO and Greg Brockman as board chair, without giving a detailed public reason beyond, in one account, apparent internal differences over "balancing safety with artificial intelligence with the desire to release new AI tools into the world." Brockman resigns from OpenAI in protest.
- 2023-11-21
- OpenAI reinstates Altman as CEO under a new board chaired by former Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor and including former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and Quora CEO Adam D'Angelo, days after an estimated 97% of employees signed a letter threatening to resign unless the board reversed course.
- 2024-05
- Chief scientist and co-founder Ilya Sutskever leaves OpenAI; he launches Safe Superintelligence Inc., a for-profit AI safety company, on June 19, 2024, with co-founders Daniel Gross and Daniel Levy.
- 2024-09-25
- Chief technology officer Mira Murati, who had served as OpenAI's interim CEO for part of the November 2023 board crisis, announces her resignation after more than six years, saying she wants "time and space" for her own exploration; Vice President of Research Barret Zoph and Chief Research Officer Bob McGrew depart the same day.
- 2025-10-02
- OpenAI completes a $6.6 billion secondary sale of current and former employees' stock to investors including Thrive Capital, SoftBank, Dragoneer, Abu Dhabi's MGX and T. Rowe Price, valuing the company at $500 billion, up from $300 billion in an earlier 2025 SoftBank-led round.
- 2025-10-28
- OpenAI completes its restructuring into a public benefit corporation (OpenAI Group), controlled by the nonprofit OpenAI Foundation. Microsoft receives a 27% stake reported at about $135 billion, on a cumulative $13.8 billion invested since 2019, and commits to a reported $250 billion Azure cloud-services agreement; the commercial partnership runs at least through 2032.
- 2026-05-18
- A federal jury in the Northern District of California unanimously dismisses all claims in Elon Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI, Sam Altman and Microsoft, finding Musk waited too long to sue over OpenAI's 2019 shift toward a for-profit structure; the jury did not rule on whether a breach of the founding agreement occurred, and Musk's attorney says he will appeal.
- 2026-09-08
- OpenAI announces that an internal AI system produced a proof concerning the "forced" branch of the Navier–Stokes Millennium Prize problem, touching off disputes over credit and independent verification; covered in a dedicated event profile.
What we could not verify
These claims came up in research and could not be confirmed. They are recorded here rather than published as fact or quietly dropped. If you hold a source that settles one, please tell us.
- Sources differ on how large and how firm OpenAI's initial "founder" roster was. This profile names only the individuals identified by name in the sources read for it (Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Greg Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, and investor Peter Thiel per MIT Technology Review); it does not claim this list is complete or resolve how each individual's role is best characterized (e.g. "founder" versus "early investor").
- No source read for this profile gives a detailed, specific public explanation from OpenAI's November 2023 board for removing Sam Altman beyond general references to differences over safety and the pace of releasing new tools. This profile does not assert a more specific reason than what was reported.
- Individual dollar amounts pledged by each named founder or backer toward the reported $1 billion in initial 2015 funding commitments were not found in the sources read for this profile; only the aggregate figure is stated.
- As with this site's existing Sam Altman profile, whether Elon Musk's attorney's stated intent to appeal the May 2026 jury verdict was formally acted on, and its status, was not confirmed in the sources read for this profile.
- The $500 billion valuation and Microsoft's approximately $135 billion stake are snapshots tied to the October 2025 transactions described above; this profile does not assert they are current as of any later date.
Sources
15 sources (11 tier 1, 3 tier 2, 1 first-party), each opened and read against the claim it supports. Statements the subject makes about itself are marked as such and are not treated as independent evidence. See the source policy.
Built primarily from encyclopedia and wire/broadcast reporting (Britannica, NPR, PBS NewsHour, Bloomberg, Al Jazeera, Fortune) plus specialist technology press (TechCrunch, MIT Technology Review, History.com), each fetched and read in full for this profile. OpenAI's own "About" page is cited only for its self-described mission statement and current corporate structure, both corroborated independently by Al Jazeera's reporting on the October 2025 restructuring. Reporting on the Musk lawsuit and the November 2023 board crisis substantially overlaps with the existing Sam Altman profile on this site, but every source below was independently fetched and read for this organization-focused profile rather than copied from that one.
- OpenAI | ChatGPT, Sam Altman, & Microsoft Supports: OpenAI's December 2015 founding, its founders, the initial $1 billion funding pledge, the 2019 hybrid nonprofit/for-profit restructuring and Microsoft's initial $1 billion investment, and the outline of the November 2023 board crisis and its reconstituted board.
- The messy, secretive reality behind OpenAI's bid to save the world Supports: The December 11, 2015 founding announcement, the individuals named as founders and early investors (Musk, Altman, Thiel, Brockman, Sutskever), the $1 billion initial funding commitment, and OpenAI's original nonprofit mission language.
- Microsoft to Invest $10 Billion in ChatGPT Maker OpenAI Supports: The January 2023 $10 billion Microsoft investment, its reference to Microsoft's prior 2019 and 2021 investments, and ChatGPT's rapid early user growth.
- ChatGPT, the generative AI chatbot, is released Supports: The November 30, 2022 release date of ChatGPT as a GPT-3.5-based research preview, and its adoption speed compared to TikTok and Instagram.
- Sam Altman reinstated as OpenAI CEO with new board replacing the one which fired him Supports: The November 2023 board crisis: Altman's firing, Greg Brockman's resignation in protest, the near-unanimous employee letter, Altman's reinstatement, and the new board led by Bret Taylor with Larry Summers and Adam D'Angelo.
- OpenAI reinstates Sam Altman as its chief executive Supports: Confirmation that the board cited differences over "balancing safety with artificial intelligence with the desire to release new AI tools" without more detailed public reasoning, and that an estimated 97% of employees signed the reinstatement letter.
- OpenAI CTO Mira Murati stepping down Supports: Mira Murati's September 25, 2024 resignation as CTO after six years, her role as interim CEO during part of the November 2023 board crisis, her stated reason for leaving, and the same-day departures of Barret Zoph and Bob McGrew.
- OpenAI restructures into public-benefit firm, Microsoft takes 27% stake Supports: The October 28, 2025 completion of OpenAI's restructuring into a public benefit corporation controlled by the nonprofit OpenAI Foundation, Microsoft's 27% stake valued at about $135 billion on a cumulative $13.8 billion invested, the reported $250 billion Azure commitment, the partnership's term through at least 2032, and Bret Taylor's quote.
- OpenAI Completes Share Sale at Record $500 Billion Valuation Supports: The October 2025 $6.6 billion secondary share sale, the investor consortium (Thrive Capital, SoftBank, Dragoneer, MGX, T. Rowe Price), the resulting $500 billion valuation, and the prior $300 billion 2025 SoftBank-led valuation.
- Jury dismisses all claims in Elon Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Supports: Musk's allegations against OpenAI, Altman and Microsoft, OpenAI's defense (that Musk supported the for-profit subsidiary and later launched competitor xAI), the May 18, 2026 jury verdict on statute-of-limitations grounds, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers's comment, and Musk attorney Marc Toberoff's statement on appealing.
- Who founded Anthropic, the makers of Claude AI, and why? Supports: Confirming that Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, both former OpenAI executives, citing AI safety concerns.
- Elon Musk leaves OpenAI board to avoid conflict of interest with Tesla Supports: The February 23, 2018 date of Elon Musk's departure from OpenAI's board and OpenAI's own stated reason (avoiding a future conflict of interest with Tesla), including OpenAI's direct blog quote.
- OpenAI's ChatGPT Now Has 100 Million Weekly Active Users Supports: Sam Altman's November 6, 2023 announcement of 100 million weekly active ChatGPT users and over 2 million developers at OpenAI's first developer conference, and the GPT-4 Turbo, GPTs and GPT Store announcements made there.
- OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever announces his new AI startup, Safe Superintelligence Supports: Ilya Sutskever's May 2024 departure from OpenAI as chief scientist and co-founder, and the June 19, 2024 launch of Safe Superintelligence Inc. with co-founders Daniel Gross and Daniel Levy.
- About OpenAI Supports: OpenAI's own current mission statement ("Ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity") and its own description of the OpenAI Foundation/OpenAI Group structure, used only alongside the independent Al Jazeera reporting on the same restructuring.
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