SoftBank, owned by Masayoshi Son, will invest $500mn in OpenAI. The investment is part of an upcoming fundraising round which should close this week. SoftBank is investing via its second Vision Fund. This large vehicle to support start-ups now comprises mainly Son’s wealth, two people familiar with the deal said.
SoftBank is joining existing investors including Microsoft, venture fund Thrive, and venture capital fund Thrive in a $6.5bn financing round. The funding round should close in the next few days, say people familiar with the talks.
SoftBank’s roughly $14bn investment into WeWork and Son’s close relationship with its founder Adam Neumann became emblematic of that period after the co-working company collapsed from a peak valuation of $47bn in 2019. SoftBank’s investment of $14bn into WeWork and Son’s close relationship with Adam Neumann, its founder, became emblematic after the collapse of WeWork from a valuation of $47bn.
Son declared that it was “time to go on the offensive” in order to capitalize on this new technology. Son has talked about the ambition to use Arm as the centerpiece of a network that advances AI.
OpenAI is finalising details for one of the largest private funding rounds ever, against a chaotic background. Mira Murati, the company’s chief technologist, left unexpectedly last week along with Bob McGrew and Barret Zoph, vice president of research.
These are the latest senior departures in this year, which have stripped OpenAI’s founding team of most of its prominent safety researchers and the majority of their founding team.
According to sources familiar with the discussions, the company is also considering a restructuring which would eliminate its current innovative arrangement in which investors own a share in a for profit subsidiary of the firm, managed by a non-profit board. As part of these plans, OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman discussed taking a first-ever direct equity stake in his company.
Many investors are still committed to the company, despite their concerns. They have shown that they will continue to support a company which has pushed AI technology to its limits. They bet that OpenAI will beat off the competition from Big Tech competitors such as Google, Meta and start-ups like Anthropic and Mistral.
The Information was the first to report SoftBank’s involvement in this round. SoftBank and OpenAI declined comment.
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