OpenAI has confidentially submitted its IPO prospectus, kicking off a $1-trillion "three-way battle" for IPOs on the U.S. stock market.

On June 8th, local time in the United States, OpenAI issued a statement on its official website, officially confirming that it had secretly submitted an S - 1 prospectus to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. This AI giant, valued at over $850 billion, has finally taken a substantial step towards the public market.

This not only means that Wall Street may witness one of the largest technology IPOs in history but also intensifies the capital race between Sam Altman, his long - time rival Elon Musk, and Dario Amodei, the CEO of the up - and - coming Anthropic, to a white - hot level.

01

The Secret Document Announced Voluntarily

Normally, secretly submitting a prospectus should be an operation carried out by a company under strict confidentiality. Sam Altman didn't intend to wait passively for the media to break the news. OpenAI stated bluntly in its statement: "We recently secretly submitted the S - 1 document. We expected it to leak, so we decided to announce it directly."

However, OpenAI also cooled down the overheated expectations in its official press release, clearly stating that it has not decided on the IPO time yet.

"It may still take some time because there are some things we want to do that might be easier to achieve as a private company. But this is a complex set of trade - offs, which gives us a choice: if going public ultimately proves to be the best option, we can move towards the public market more quickly."

This statement not only shows an eagerness to embrace capital but also leaves some leeway between the unfulfilled mission and huge interests.

This filing is made under Section 135 of the U.S. Securities Act of 1933 and does not constitute an offer to sell securities.

Sarah Friar, OpenAI's Chief Financial Officer, said in April this year that for a company of OpenAI's size, it is "good practice" to "look, feel, and act" like a public company, but she did not comment on the specific timeline at that time.

People familiar with the matter revealed that OpenAI also plans to conduct a tender offer, allowing employees to sell their shares at the latest post - investment valuation of $852 billion to relieve the recent liquidity pressure.

02

The IPO Race Among the Three Giants

OpenAI's move basically replicates the path of its "arch - enemy" Anthropic.

On June 1st, Anthropic just announced that it had secretly submitted an IPO application and, with a valuation of $965 billion in the private market, it exceeded OpenAI's valuation of $852 billion set at the end of March this year for the first time.

Meanwhile, SpaceX, under Elon Musk, has already initiated the IPO roadshow and is expected to go public as early as June 12th. In its listing documents, OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google are all listed as "major competitors" in the AI field.

These three companies are very likely to account for several of the largest IPOs in human history.

Jeff Bernstein, a capital markets advisor at consulting firm Riveron, pointed out the essence of this race: "This is a battle for capital." He implied that if one competitor gets ahead, it will take away a large amount of available IPO capital.

However, being the first to go public does not guarantee better returns.

Take Lyft and Uber as an example. Both companies secretly submitted applications in December 2018. Lyft went public in March 2019, and Uber followed two months later. But one year after going public, Lyft's stock price dropped by about 66% compared to the issue price, while Uber only dropped by about 30% during the same period.

03

Sam Altman's Financial Cards

According to officially disclosed data, within one year after the release of ChatGPT, the company's annual revenue exceeded $1 billion. By the end of 2024, this figure had evolved into a quarterly revenue of $1 billion.

Currently, OpenAI's monthly revenue has reached $2 billion. The official even boasted that its revenue growth rate is four times that of giants in the Internet and mobile eras such as Alphabet and Meta during the same period.

At the user level, ChatGPT's weekly active users have exceeded 900 million, and the number of subscribed users has exceeded 50 million. Its monthly web page visits and mobile - end conversations are six times those of the next - closest AI application. The total usage time accounts for four times that of competitors and is also four times the sum of all other AI applications. The usage of the search function has nearly tripled in one year, and the advertising pilot project achieved an annual recurring revenue of over $100 million in less than six weeks.

The enterprise - level market currently contributes more than 40% of the company's revenue and is expected to catch up with the consumer - level business by the end of 2026.

Driven by GPT - 5.4, the usage rate of the agent workflow is growing explosively, and the API's processing volume per minute has exceeded 150 billion Tokens. The weekly active users of Codex have exceeded 2 million, with a five - fold increase in the past three months, and the month - on - month growth rate has remained above 70%.

However, behind the impressive revenue is a money - burning black hole that no listed company can ignore.

OpenAI has raised over $180 billion, but in the process of ensuring computing power and building infrastructure to train and run AI models, the cash consumption is astonishing. The forecasts shared with investors show that if calculated according to the signed multi - billion - dollar commitments up to 2030, its money - burning speed will outpace that of any other listed company in history.

04

The Vision of the "Third Stage"

On the same day as submitting the S - 1, Altman and Jakub Pachocki, the current Chief Scientist of OpenAI, co - authored a long article titled "Benefiting Everyone: Our Plan", systematically elaborating on the company's vision of entering the "third stage".

The article compares the popularization of AI to the entry of electricity into rural America in the 1920s. Electricity didn't change every household overnight, but as it became more widespread, daily life changed fundamentally. Nights were extended by lights, heavy labor was alleviated by electrical appliances, and radios brought distant voices into the living room. By the end of the 20th century, the average human lifespan was extended by about 23 years, and the inflation - adjusted average income increased by about 50%. These achievements are largely attributed to electrification and related technological progress.

"This scenario is being re - enacted with AI," the two wrote.

But they immediately pointed out that such a future will not come automatically. "Transformative technologies can concentrate power or broaden it. They can make life easier for a few or expand opportunities for the majority."

The article divides OpenAI's history into three stages.

The first stage is to conduct research on AGI. The second stage began when the research was connected to the real world, and the company became a product company, deploying systems and learning how people use them.

"Now, we are entering the third stage. The economy is starting to be reshaped around AI. The core question now is how to make advanced AI abundant, affordable, safe, useful, and convenient enough for everyone and every organization to benefit from it."

The article clearly states three main current goals: building an automated AI researcher, with the internal belief that by March 2028, a significant portion of research will be jointly completed by AI systems and researchers; accelerating economic development and ensuring that the benefits are widely shared; and providing personal AGI for everyone on the planet.

05

The Uncertainties of the Competition

Just as OpenAI submitted its prospectus, the company is also brewing changes at the product level.

On June 7th, the Financial Times reported, citing people familiar with the matter, that OpenAI is making a major overhaul of ChatGPT. It plans to integrate the programming tool Codex into the chat interface as a whole and connect external partner applications, reshaping it into a super - entry point capable of performing multiple tasks.

However, before the product is actually launched, the more urgent test still comes from the public market.

OpenAI, SpaceX, and Anthropic are all seeking to go public at huge valuations, and the three companies may raise up to tens of billions of dollars from the public market in total. Bankers have told these companies that whoever goes public first will define this emerging industry and be able to take advantage of the large amount of funds eager to invest in AI companies.

Shortly after the lawsuit noise with Musk subsided, Altman is leading OpenAI towards a future that he himself calls a "complex trade - off".

The investors' reaction to SpaceX's large - scale IPO, the overall health of the global economy, the company's own financial strength, as well as the unpredictable revenue growth and soaring computing costs, will all affect OpenAI's final IPO timeline.

The answer may lie in the as - yet - unpublished prospectus.

This article is from the WeChat official account "Tencent Technology". The author is Su Yang, and the editor is Xu Qingyang. It is published by 36Kr with permission.