OpenAI IPO will happen ASAP, say insiders

Sam Altman’s OpenAI could lose money to the tune of $1 billion per month. It may be difficult to convert more than 5% of ChatGPT users into paying customers. And it could lose ground to rivals like Anthropic (creators of the much-teased Claude Mythos) and Google (creators of the freshly updated Gemini).

But OpenAI investors still believe they can cash in — perhaps to the tune of $1 trillion — if the company goes public soon.

And now that Elon Musk’s lawsuit (who claimed OpenAI defrauded him when it converted to a for-profit company) has been thrown out at trial on technical grounds, the launch window appears to be opening.

Sources at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley told reporters at the press conference The Wall Street Journal that the OpenAI IPO would be filed with regulators as early as this Friday. And even if the plans remain “fluid”, Newspaper warned, this would mean you’ll likely see OpenAI stock debut on the NYSE as soon as September.

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Musk, meanwhile, says he plans to appeal the trial’s verdict; A bonanza IPO for a company still nominally governed by a nonprofit board could help strengthen its case. Ironically, Musk is currently distracted by his own pending IPO windfall; SpaceX, fresh off its acquisition of xAI, is also reportedly set to file documents with regulators this week.

Thus, Altman, increasingly Musk’s sworn enemy in matters of AI, could well suffer a bit of his rival’s thunder here. But exactly how much Altman will win from an OpenAI IPO remains a mystery.

The CEO confirmed in court what had been an open secret for some time: that Altman had indeed invested in the company, through a fund from the Silicon Valley incubator he ran, YCombinator.

In 2023, Altman told the U.S. Senate that he had no financial interest in the company, according to The Atlantic. He is now the target of an investigation by Republican members of the House Oversight Committee, which is examining OpenAI’s habit of striking deals with other companies in which Altman has invested.

In other words, Altman’s well-documented reputation for telling people what they want to hear might be catching up with him, while the wheels wobble a bit on the OpenAI train. And yet, at the same time, a payday of unknown magnitude approaches.

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Disclosure: Ziff Davis, the parent company of Mashable, filed a lawsuit in April 2025 against OpenAI, alleging that it had violated Ziff Davis’ copyrights in the training and operation of its AI systems.