OpenAI missed revenue targets, CFO warns

OpenAI missed internal targets for new users and revenue in recent months, according to a Wall Street Journal report published Monday. (wsj.com) (reuters.com) Reuters said the misses raised concern among some OpenAI leaders about whether the company can support its extensive data-center spending if growth slows. The Journal said the debate has reached the chief financial officer and board. (reuters.com) (wsj.com) The pressure comes after Sarah Friar said in January that OpenAI’s annualized revenue had passed $20 billion in 2025, up from $6 billion in 2024. That made the latest miss notable because it followed a year of triple-digit growth. (reuters.com) OpenAI is also carrying unusually large infrastructure commitments for a private company. Reuters reported last month that SoftBank secured a $40 billion bridge loan to support further OpenAI investment. (reuters.com) The Journal said Anthropic has gained ground in coding and enterprise markets, two areas where OpenAI has been pushing hard for paid adoption. Google has also rolled out new AI agents for business customers this month. (wsj.com) (mercurynews.com) OpenAI has been leaning more heavily into enterprise sales as consumer chatbot growth gets harder to sustain at the same pace. Reuters reported on April 21 that the company expanded partnerships with major consulting firms to speed up adoption of its Codex tools inside large companies. (reuters.com) The company’s financing backdrop has grown more demanding too. TechCrunch reported on March 31 that OpenAI closed a $122 billion funding round at an $852 billion valuation, with investors expecting rapid growth and a path to public markets. (techcrunch.com) OpenAI did not immediately comment to Reuters on the Journal report. For now, the story is not that demand for artificial intelligence vanished; it is that OpenAI’s targets rose even faster than its business. (reuters.com)