According to ChainCatcher, reported by Jinshi, The Information disclosed that OpenAI CEO Altman hopes to convert this nonprofit-managed AI development company into a for-profit entity, and the biggest obstacle he faces is Microsoft. The company's influence in this process is immense, as it has committed over $13 billion to OpenAI.
Since October last year, the two companies have been negotiating potential changes to OpenAI's structure, focusing mainly on four aspects:
Microsoft's equity in the for-profit entity;
Will Microsoft continue to be OpenAI's exclusive cloud service provider;
How long will Microsoft maintain the right to use OpenAI's intellectual property to meet its product needs;
Will Microsoft continue to extract 20% from OpenAI's revenue.
It is currently unclear when OpenAI and Microsoft plan to complete this process, but both parties are moving quickly and facing time pressure: if OpenAI fails to complete the transition within the next two years, recently funded investors can reclaim their funds along with 9% interest — totaling about $7.2 billion. Company leadership has already informed employees that OpenAI hopes to repurchase some of their shares after the profitable transformation, so employees currently have ample reason to hope for this change to be completed as soon as possible.