PANews reported on November 27 that according to CNBC, OpenAI allows employees to sell about $1.5 billion worth of stock in a new acquisition offer to SoftBank. People familiar with the matter said that the new financing will enable SoftBank to obtain a larger share of OpenAI's shares, and will also enable current and former employees of OpenAI to cash out their shares. The new tender offer is scheduled to end this week. The deal was promoted by SoftBank founder and CEO Masayoshi Son, who has been asking for a larger stake after investing $500 million in OpenAI's last round of financing. This tender offer has nothing to do with OpenAI's plan to reorganize the company into a for-profit enterprise.
Even without SoftBank's deep pockets, OpenAI has had no trouble raising billions of dollars in cash, the report said. In the two years since ChatGPT was launched, its valuation has climbed to $157 billion. OpenAI has raised about $13 billion from Microsoft and completed its latest $6.6 billion round of financing in October, led by Thrive Capital, with participation from chipmaker Nvidia, SoftBank and other investors. The company also secured a $4 billion revolving credit line, bringing its total liquidity to more than $10 billion.
