OpenAI tests investor appetite for a $1.2tn valuation before an eventual IPO

OpenAI has begun early conversations about another private round at a valuation of $1.2tn or more. No transaction is assured, and the timing depends partly on whether the company waits until 2027 or later to pursue an IPO.

The pitch has strengthened since a $122bn March round valued OpenAI at $852bn. The Financial Times reports that annualised revenue exceeded $40bn last month, helped by GPT-5.6 and Astra, and that revenue rose roughly 20% after the July model launch. Yet OpenAI also spent about $34bn last year. A new round would therefore do two things at once: mark up existing stakes and finance another period in which research, chips and data centres consume exceptional amounts of cash.

The valuation should not be read as a conventional earnings multiple. It is a wager that OpenAI can retain a large share of the economic value created by increasingly capable models before competition, falling inference prices or infrastructure commitments compress that value. Staying private gives management more freedom to pursue that wager, but delays liquidity for earlier investors and leaves less public visibility into the obligations supporting it.