Sam Altman touts ChatGPT progress as OpenAI nears $100 billion funding

As OpenAI faces intensifying strain from rival Anthropic’s improved coding instruments, CEO Sam Altman is telling workers and buyers that his firm is seeing its share of momentum.

Altman advised OpenAI workers on Friday that ChatGPT, the corporate’s well-liked synthetic intelligence chatbot, is “again to exceeding 10% month-to-month progress,” in accordance with an inner Slack message seen by CNBC. OpenAI can also be getting ready to launch “an up to date Chat mannequin” this week, Altman stated.

Greater than 800 million folks use ChatGPT every week, however Google and Anthropic have been gaining floor. OpenAI declared a “code purple” in December to enhance ChatGPT, and briefly sidelined a number of initiatives to concentrate on that effort.

In his message on Friday, Altman stated OpenAI’s coding product, Codex, grew about 50% from every week in the past. Codex competes instantly with Anthropic’s Claude Code, which has seen a wave of adoption during the last 12 months.

OpenAI launched a brand new Codex mannequin, GPT‑5.3-Codex, final week, in addition to a stand-alone app for customers with Apple computer systems. Altman stated Codex’s progress is “insane,” in accordance with the interior message.

“This was an excellent week,” Altman wrote.

It was additionally a contentious week.

Altman and different senior executives took to social media to reply to swipes from Anthropic, which ran Tremendous Bowl advertisements that poked enjoyable at OpenAI’s choice to run advertisements inside ChatGPT. In a publish on X, Altman stated that the commercials have been “misleading” and that OpenAI would “clearly by no means run advertisements in the best way Anthropic depicts them.”

On Monday, OpenAI will formally start testing advertisements inside ChatGPT, in accordance with an individual accustomed to the matter who requested to not be named because of confidentiality. Final month the corporate stated the advertisements might be clearly labeled, seem on the backside of the chatbot’s solutions and won’t affect ChatGPT’s responses.

OpenAI expects advertisements to make up lower than half of its income long run, the particular person stated. The digital advert market has lengthy been dominated by Google and Meta, with Amazon turning into a much bigger participant lately.

Altman and CFO Sarah Friar have been promoting buyers on OpenAI’s progress story as the corporate appears to wrap up what might be a $100 billion fundraising spherical, sources advised CNBC.

In personal conferences, the executives are highlighting OpenAI’s power with customers, rising enterprise enterprise and entry to compute, in accordance one particular person, who requested to not be named as a result of the talks are personal.

OpenAI has been circulating charts as a part of the discussions. One chart reveals that Codex, based mostly on inner information, is consuming into Claude Code’s market share, in accordance with a screenshot seen by CNBC.

OpenAI expects fundraising talks to warmth up over the subsequent two weeks, one particular person stated. OpenAI closed a $41 billion spherical in March than included a $30 billion contribution from SoftBank and $11 billion from different buyers.

The present funding spherical might shut in two elements, as CNBC beforehand reported. The primary would come with capital from Microsoft and Nvidia in addition to Amazon, which is in talks to speculate as much as $50 billion within the firm. Different contributions from contributors like SoftBank, which has mentioned placing in one other $30 billion, would comply with.