After Anthropic, OpenAI files for IPO that could top $1 trillion, but says going public 'may be a while' away
OpenAI has submitted a confidential S-1 filing to the US Securities and Exchange Commission, formally taking the first official step towards what would be one
OpenAI has submitted a confidential S-1 filing to the US Securities and Exchange Commission, formally taking the first official step towards what would be one of the most consequential public listings in technology history, even as the company cautioned on Monday that a stock market debut may still be some time away. OpenAI's Confidential IPO Filing Arrives One Week After Rival Anthropic Made the Same Move The ChatGPT developer announced the filing in a characteristically brief blog post, one week after its principal competitor Anthropic disclosed its own confidential S-1 submission on 1 June. The two back-to-back filings from the world's most closely watched artificial intelligence laboratories have intensified speculation about which company will reach the public market first, even as each insists the other's timing has no bearing on its own plans. Also Read | SpaceX IPO Puts a Spotlight on How the Newly Wealthy Shop for Financial Advisors A confidential S-1 submission allows a company to present its financial disclosures to regulators for review without immediately making those documents available to the general public or prospective investors. Such filings typically precede an actual listing by six to nine months, though the timeline varies considerably. OpenAI Says the IPO Timing Is Undecided and That Going Public 'May Be a While' Away In what it conceded it expected to become public anyway, OpenAI published the full text of its announcement on Monday (8 June) without embellishment. "We expect it to leak so we're just announcing it," the company said. "We have not decided on timing yet; it may be a while because there are things we want to do that are likely easier as a private company." The company left the door open to an earlier listing should circumstances warrant.
"But it's a complicated set of tradeoffs and this gives us the option to go public sooner if that ends up being best," it added. OpenAI's chief financial officer Sarah Friar had told CNBC in April that it was "good hygiene" for a company of OpenAI's size to "look and feel and act" like a public company, though she declined at the time to specify any listing timeline. OpenAI at $852 Billion and Anthropic at $965 Billion Are Both Expected to List Above $1 Trillion OpenAI's most recent funding round, completed in March, placed the company's valuation at $852 billion, making it one of the most valuable private enterprises in the world. Anthropic, which closed a funding round in May, is currently valued at $965 billion. Both companies are expected to seek valuations exceeding $1 trillion at the time of their eventual listings, a threshold that would represent approximately ten times the valuation at which Facebook went public in 2012. OpenAI is working with Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley on the filing, the same two banks listed as lead advisers on SpaceX's public offering, whose roadshow began last week. Sam Altman Says OpenAI Is Not in an IPO Race With Anthropic and Will List When the Timing Makes Sense OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman sought to reframe the narrative around the duelling filings, rejecting the suggestion that the company is competing with Anthropic to reach the public market first. "I think there is a race to deliver the best technology and build the best business," Altman told CNBC. "But, you know, going public is a financing event, and I don't think that's one that we're focused on the timing of.
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