PANews, November 27 - According to CNBC, OpenAI is allowing employees to sell approximately $1.5 billion worth of stock in a new acquisition offer made by SoftBank. Sources indicate that this new funding will enable SoftBank to acquire a larger stake in OpenAI, while also allowing current and former employees of OpenAI to cash out their shares. The new acquisition plan is set to conclude this week, and the deal is being driven by SoftBank founder and CEO Masayoshi Son, who has been asking for a larger stake after investing $500 million in OpenAI's previous financing round. This acquisition offer is unrelated to OpenAI's potential plans to restructure the company into a for-profit entity.
It is reported that even without the strong financial backing of SoftBank, OpenAI has not had any issues raising billions of dollars in cash. In the two years since the launch of ChatGPT, its valuation has soared to $157 billion. OpenAI has raised approximately $13 billion from Microsoft and completed its latest round of $6.6 billion funding led by Thrive Capital in October, with participation from chipmaker Nvidia, SoftBank, and other investors. The company has also secured a $4 billion revolving credit facility, bringing its total liquidity to over $10 billion.