OpenAI Weighing Funding Round at Over $1.2 Trillion Valuation

(Bloomberg) -- OpenAI is holding early talks with investors about a fresh funding round that would value the ChatGPT creator at more than $1.2 trillion ahead of an initial public offering.

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Any decision to move forward with the fundraise will hinge on exactly when OpenAI decides to go public, a person familiar with the talks said, asking not to be identified. The talks were initiated by investors, the person said.

Such a fundraise would set the stage for a long-anticipated initial public offering, which OpenAI Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman told Fortune earlier is still in the works but would not happen this year. A funding round of that magnitude would meanwhile allow OpenAI to leapfrog its chief rival Anthropic, which raised funds in May at a $965 billion valuation, including the new investment.

The Financial Times reported on the talks earlier on Tuesday, noting that the round would allow longtime backers to increase their exposure ahead of the company's IPO.

Anthropic is preparing for its own IPO and has picked Nasdaq as its listing venue. The Claude chatbot maker is seeking to raise as much as or more than SpaceX in an IPO that could take place as soon as October, Bloomberg has reported. SpaceX raised a record $86.3 billion in its offering in June.

Altman told Fortune in his interview that the company will likely not go public until 2027.