OpenAI's business model is, at bottom, pretty simple. Sam Altman gets up on a stage somewhere, burbles a few lines about how AI is going to radically upend society and cure cancer, and then shareholders fall over themselves in a frenzied rush to thrust money upon this economic miracle-to-be. OpenAI sells subscriptions to users, sure, but the real profit is in the promises.
As reported by the New York Times' Dealbook, OpenAI has raised $8.3 billion in a new funding round that values the company at $300 billion. This news comes ahead of schedule: OpenAI's last crazy investment round was the announcement of a $30 billion deal with SoftBank, on top of which it raised another $2.5 billion from VC firms, before saying it planned to raise another $7.5 billion by the end of the year. Job done, and handsomely, with five months to go.
